Wonder Girl Knits

my new apartment

2006-07-24T15:28:00.000-07:00

i am officially moved in to my new apartment. sort of. i mean, i am moved in, but my roommate moira is still on her way back from her travels, so has not moved in yet. thus, the apartment feels lonely.

i LOVE the apartment. it's really light and spacious and pretty. and new. and has lots of outlets (this might seem like a strange thing to get excited about, but neither of my apartments in san francisco had more than one outlet per room. it was a nuisance to say the least.).

as promised (to moira), here our some pics of our new place.

our living room, which faces the street:

another shot of our living room, from the other direction. i took this while standing in front of the windows.

and a third shot of our living room, also taken while standing in front of the windows. those two doors you can see down the hallway are to the two bedrooms.

and a shot of our kitchen. the kitchen is off the main room just before the short hallway to the bedrooms.

and finally some shots of moira's room (moo, sorry the light is bad in these. they looked fine on my camera, and not as fine when i just uploaded them onto my computer):

h is for ...

2006-07-22T17:32:00.000-07:00

hot.

humid.

horribly sweaty.

i forgot what the east coast is like in the summer. it's all heat and humidity, until you have a big thunderstorm that does something about the heat and the humidity for a brief while (during that brief while you can't really go outside and play because it's raining, thundering, and lightening). but only a brief while, then the h & h start to build up again and then the whole cycle starts again.

in the midst of all this heat and humidity, thunder and lightening, i attempted to work on the wedding blanket.

c is for CRAZY.

i managed about three rows before my legs were so sweaty from the weight of the blanket on them that i was worried i would leave permanent sweat stains on my poor little (seriously belated) wedding blanket.

g is for gross.

left to right

2006-07-11T14:13:00.000-07:00

m is no longer for moving. m is for moved. i've been on the east coast for almost nine whole days and have spent a fair portion of each one of those days missing san francisco. luckily i have a whole host of things going on in my life to be excited about and a trip back to sf at the end of the month to look forward to.

my last week in san francisco was, as some might have predicted, a little bit of a whirlwind. i packed and packed and packed - and donated bags and bags of stuff to goodwill - and the end never seemed to get closer. but after one last massive trip to the post office with my last 11 boxes of belongings (notice i say "last" 11 - that would indicate that there were several boxes that preceeded these 11. my parents, having seen the size of my future nyc apartment (yes, i got an apartment! more on that later!) are less than thrilled about the prospect of spending the next year with these boxes for company), i was packed and ready to go a whole 24 HOURS before my flight. this should be considered somewhat miraculous.

i spent my first three days back on the right coast acclimating (sort of) to the heat and humidity. i always forget how miserable east coast summers can be. i'm sort of adjusted, but have been getting funny looks from my parents when i take a couple of extra layers with me, you know, just in case the fog rolls in and the temperature drops 15 degrees. oh wait. that's NEVER going to happen.

after three days of rest and recuperation, i headed into nyc to begin the apartment hunting process. i've done my fair share of apartment hunting, but only in san francisco, so this was my first foray into the nyc real estate zoo. to make matters more complicated, my future roomie, is traveling in the wilds of syria right now.

what i learned on my apartment hunt:

1. real estate brokers are really, really expensive
2. real estate brokers make the whole apartment hunting process way, way less painful than it would otherwise be

i met ron, my trusty real estate dude, at around 3p on thursday. we spent 30 or 40 minutes going over my needs (cheap. cheap. cheap.) and then he sent me out with trusty real estate assistant rob to actually see some apartments.

there are no words to describe the first two apartments that i saw with rob (also, since two other real estate brokers showed me these apartments, they are apparently the only 2 two bedroom apartments for $2000 available in this stretch of manhattan). dank, dirty, and disgusting are three that come to mind. all for the bargain basement price of $2010. yes, that's real. rob the real estate assistant was able to look at me with a straight face and tell me that i should be excited about the prospect of paying $1005 a month for a bedroom in which i would be lucky to squeeze half of a twin bed.

i started getting nervous.

we had a brief break before our next appointment, so we separated and at the appointed time, i made my way over to harlem. bring on harlem. the block that the apartment is on is a really pretty tree-lined stretch of urban oasis with new townhouses on both sides. i started to get excited.

the owner, guy, let us into the apartment and within two steps, i knew i wanted it. it's on the third floor of a three-story townhouse and is light-filled, and spacious, and new, and has pretty floors, and is clean. and CHEAP! i wanted it. i wantedwantedwanted it. one teensy, tinsy little problem. my roommate was in syria with no reliable method of communication.

well, my friends, that is what we call a dilemma. so i did what i could. i called my roommate's mom. by the time we finally connected, i was a few beers into my night and had to run out of the extremely loud bar that i was in, all the while screaming "hold on, mrs. s., hold on!" long story short, mrs. s said to do what i thought was best. i slept on it, decided i needed back-up, called my parents, they drove in, and we made a group decision to just go for it. submitted an application and two hours later found out that i got the apartment! so exciting.

i don't have pictures of the inside yet, but here's one of the outside. we have the top floor, those four windows:

and here's one of our block:

and two of lenox avenue, which is just at the end of our block:

that last one has my mom in it, in case you couldn't tell.

i went in yesterday to sign the lease and should have the keys by friday. more pictures of the inside to follow soon.

my one small piece of knitting news. after a few, frantic days during which i thought that the postal service had lost my entire stash, both boxes showed up on my parents' doorstep. phew.

ply a little tenderness.

2006-07-03T15:44:00.000-07:00

welcome back friends.
first and foremost, today is a sad day. charis, aka c-dawg-knit - by far the most active and dedicated member of this blog - has left the west coast to persue her dreams in the big apple. after a frenzied week of packing boxes upon boxes of shoes and yarn and handbags, charis has up and left us...though don't be afraid, dear readers - i am counting on her to continue to motivate me to knit, laugh and watch cheesey movies - even from the east coast.

charis, i and the rest of the west coast will miss you. lots.

in honor of charis persuing her dreams, i have learned how to ply yarn.
first i spun this:

some wonderful camel-colored corriedale from Weavers Oaks in Novato, CA.

and then i plied it:

and now i'm knitting it up into the blanket from this book

i hope this doesn't turn into wedding blanket part two...

m is for moving

2006-06-23T14:01:00.000-07:00

i have no knitting progress to post because i had to mail all my knitting to the other side of the country. i'm about 8 days away from my SF departure (tears, wails, many other sad expressions) and realized, perhaps somewhat belatedly, that my yarn collection had far surpassed an amount that would fit neatly into a carry-on. so i packed it up. after vacuum packing it in ziplock bags, i managed to fit all of it (and most of my on-going projects, so think lots of happy thoughts about the usps' ability to get it to CT safely) in two medium size boxes. YES!

so now i'm knitting-less. well, that's not entirely true. i forgot to pack rogue, so i still have that to work on.

HAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAA

that's funny. as if in my completely, utterly stress/freaked out/sad/emotional state, the thing i need to be working on is the most complicated pattern ever created. needless, i've hidden rogue in a drawer so the very sight of it won't stress me out even more.

in other moving news, i think i'm selling my car this afternoon. i'm actually 99.9% positive that i'm selling my car. and while i'm excited to have the extra cash influx, and while i know that selling my car was the right thing to do, i'm still feeling very, very sad about it. i've had my car for 11 years, since i was 16. it is the first, and only, car i have driven. i know it's just a car, and that i am probably being way overly emotional about it, but i kind of feel like - and this is so cheesy that i can't even believe i'm going to write - that that car has taken me on a journey from teenagehood to adulthood (feel free to laugh hysterically at me).

but, since i will no longer be driving, the car is going to buy me some drinks this evening to make me feel better.

Walking/Running/Knitting!!!

2006-06-09T15:12:00.000-07:00

I'm getting geared up for the big weekend. My goal this weekend is to knit 2 Nova bags for our Avon Walk for Breast Cancer PLUS visit the wonderful Adirondack Yarn shop and buy "several" skeins of wool for more bags PLUS on Sunday I'm walk/running the Lake PLacid Half Marathon. Just spent 3 hours in the car and was able to finish knitting a blue Nova bag-hope to felt it tomorrow as I rest up for the big day on Sunday.

knitting, felting and walking for a cause.

2006-06-06T13:53:00.000-07:00

a little letter that we sent out today.
(i know, charis, this doesn't count as a *real* post)
Dear friends and family,

This July, we're participating in the 39 mile Avon Walk for Breast
Cancer in San Francisco to raise money for breast cancer research and early detection programs.

We have less than a month to meet our fundraising goal and have decided to use our knitting skills to encourage you to give! Bonnie, Maggie and our Mema have designed, knit and felted unique wool handbags in a variety of colors. You can see some of them at http://www.wondergirlknits.com/

If you'd like a bag, we're asking for a $125 contribution to The Avon Foundation - email Maggie at maggie@worldknits.com. Guys - they make great gifts!

If you just want to make a donation, you can do it online by following this link:
http://walk.avonfoundation.org/site/TR?pg=personal&fr_id=1190&px=2121669
(click on "support me" and follow the instructions)
(also linked on the pink button on our side bar)

Feel free to forward this email to friends!

Thanks a bunch,
Maggie and Bonnie Clark

ps. a *huge* thank you to those of you who have already donated!

Hello everyone!

2006-06-03T12:34:00.000-07:00

Wonder Girl Knits

A great day to share some of my projects-it is raining here in New England so I'm doing some felting.
Here's a few of my recent "things"-first a baby blanket made out of Baby Dale & Debbie Bliss Cashmerino. I have a feeling I have already shared this photo-but I really did love that blanket!

The other photo is of a pile of felted bags that my friend Pam & I have been making. I have been selling them to help raise money for the Avon Walk for Breat Cancer-more to come on that project-stay tuned! I've also thrown in a phot of the mittens I'm embarking on! In my spare time I've done several pairs of socks-such fun!

My latest love is a Mission Falls 1894 Cotton baby blanket-need to have it finished by this Thursday.

Want to throw a thought out there-I have a yearning to purchase a spinning wheel-good idea don't you think?

Good to be back & I really need to perfect posting these photos!!!

the silence is deafening

2006-05-30T17:02:00.000-07:00

so i thought maybe a little hiatus from my blogging duties would encourage some of my erstwhile co-bloggers to post about what they've been up to. and then i got busy. and then i got lazy. and then i realized that i really haven't been knitting lately. and then i got busy again. so all of a sudden my little hiatus turned into a big, ole long hiatus. whoopsie.

but here i am! i still don't really have any knitting progress to talk about. i have been knitting on the wedding blanket off and on. and a little bit on my sock. (which is so, so, so tiny that i think i might need to turn it into a wristwarmer and start all over again. but the thought of starting over is really depressing, and i can't bear to make that decision quite yet. so i just keep knitting. which means the teeniest sock ever just keeps getting longer, which means that pretty soon it will be suitable for neither a sock nor a wristwarmer. oh, the curse of indecisiveness!)

so what, you may ask, have i been doing with myself? well.

i ran a half-marathon in vancouver with my friends matt and ccd. there were many parts of this weekend that were fabulously, amazingly fun. we spent two nights in seattle hanging out with various friends and had ourselves a crazy (though not particularly restful) time. that was fun. we drove from seattle to vancouver which was fun in a "i'm laughing hysterically because i'm delirious from lack of sleep way."* then the fun kind of stopped for awhile. the reason is stopped is because we actually had to run the half-marathon that was the whole reason for our trip. that's not all that much fun regardless of the circumstances, but the fact that this particular not-fun half-marathon occurred in a period of 40 degree weather and pouring rain (and occurred with a set of race organizers who forgot to deliver the water for a majority of the water stops on the course) made it even less fun. but we all made it through, with good times no less! then we started having fun again for awhile. we had yummy brunch where i was able to get bacon despite a last minute panic attack that i would order bacon thinking i was getting bacon and would instead receive canadian bacon. then we set off to peruse the city, on foot, thinking that we would be stretching out our tired legs to good effect. a couple of beers and a horrible restaurant recommendation later, we had walked not 1, not 2, but 9 miles across the city of vancouver. there was whimpering involved. that was not so much fun. but we made it back to the hotel, and eventually back to san francisco, in one piece, if a wee bit sore.

hmm. that really only took a weekend though. what else have i been doing? ooh, ooh! i published my first freelance article (actually, my first article ever). check it out. and i started work on my second freelance article. also exciting.

i've also been working (in a half-hearted kind of way) and getting ready to move (also extremely half-heartedly) but those bits aren't nearly as exciting (although they've probably taken up more of my time than anything else).

anyway, that's really all that i've got. i'll end by promising to blog more frequently and maybe to do some knitting.

*I would like to note that the drive was probably more fun for ccd and me than it was for matt. matt got forced into the driver's seat of our rental car because i didn't realize that my license had been expired for over a month until i got to seattle and because ccd is maybe the worst driver ever and would have killed us before we got out of the state of washington. actually, she maybe would have killed us before we got out of the seattle metropolitan area. no offense, ceecer. you're a wonderful person, just a terrible driver.

is anybody out there?

2006-04-18T13:48:00.000-07:00

i know you could be asking the same thing of me. in defense of my absence from the blog over the past 15 days, i submit the following:

1. i'm now in my late 20s and am getting a little forgetful
2. i went to new york to visit grad schools
3. i decided on a grad school (columbia! yay!) and got so excited and flustered that all other thoughts flew right out of my head
4. i have to re-write my climate change article for about the 18th time
5. since getting back from new york last wednesday, i've had a social event every single evening (except sunday which i spent in a stupor on the couch recuperating from the previous three evenings)
6. my liver hurts a little bit
7. it FINALLY stopped raining
8. i haven't managed to knit ANYTHING in the past 15 days. literally not one stitch.
9. the man sitting across from me is eating his quiche in the most peculiar manner (okay, okay ... that's not really a reason in defense of my absence ... but the man just performed surgery on his quiche. that's weird.)

anyhoo, i'm back! yay! rejoice, rejoice! hallelujah!

the past two weeks have been a little bit of a whirlwind - wheeeeeeeeeeeeee! i told work yesterday that i'm not coming back - yay! it's sunny - whoopee! it stays light until 7:30 - yippeeee! i'm taking the whole month of july off of work - yahoo!

so yeah, i'm back. but i ask you - where's maggie? i mean, i know what she's going to say:

1. her internet doesn't work when it's raining
2. her parents are in town (not so much of a defense when one of said parents is the infamous superbon, also a missing contributor from the blog)
3. she's been swimming in pearls

but that's all i can come up with ... so mags, no more excuses. we want you back in action.

moving on up

2006-04-03T00:08:00.000-07:00

i'm realizing that my last post may have been just ever-so-slightly depressing.

whoops.

i mean, i was a smidge depressed when i wrote it. but since then, things have really started to look up for ole c-dawg:

1. i finished my global warming article

2. i'm beginning to realize that the guy i spent part of wednesday (fine. most of wednesday. details, people, details.) shedding tears over really isn't worth my time anyway

3. i finished the front of the skinny sweater

4. i turned 27 (i'm not sure if this is officially a "looking up" event but i'm really trying to view getting older through a glass-half-full lens)

5. I GOT IN TO COLUMBIA JOURNALISM SCHOOL (this is the bit that i'm super duper excited about)

6. the woman i wrote the global warming article for emailed me back and said it was very well done and she just has a few small edits for me

7. because of item #6, it looks like i am very, very close to having my very, very first piece of writing published. in print. for real. (okay, okay ... it's not technically in print because it's just on-line. but i bet can get a print copy for anyone who wants one (it's called pressing the print button on my browser). don't all clamor at once)

8. i had a wonderful, fabulous birthday party with my wonderful, fabulous friends who i am going to miss dreadfully when i move to new york (i have to keep saying that i'm moving to new york so it starts to sound more real)

9. maggie gave me a ball winder

10. i'm going to new york this coming weekend, and i'll get to see my fam

so there. yay life!

stuck in a coffee shop

2006-03-29T11:49:00.000-08:00

i'm stuck in a coffee shop. when i left my house this morning, it was mildly cloudy but definitely not raining. therefore, i decided against the rain jacket in favor of the warmer (but hoodless) fleece. clearly i haven't learned much in my nearly five years of san francisco living. because now it's pouring. and i'm wearing flip flops and don't have a hood. so i'm stuck.

today is my first day off after nine consecutive days of work. to be fair, i didn't work full days on each and every one of those nine days, but since some of them were more than full days (i.e., 11a to 11p on Sunday), i think it averages out. needless to say, i'm kinda pooped. which makes the fact that my global warming article is due tomorrow even more distressing. because instead of spending the day snuggled up on my couch snoozing, and maybe knitting a little, i'm spending the day writing, re-writing, banging my head against the wall, re-re-writing, and wishing i had never committed to writing this article. sounds fun, no?

to make it all that much better, i'm in the midst of an emotional breakdown of the worst kind - the kind where you know it's kinda (mostly) your fault that you're at the point you're at, and that just makes you even more upset over something you would be upset at regardless. do you ever get to the end of something, the end of a relationship, and you look back and you don't understand how you got to where you are? i mean, you look back at all the little steps you took, the little lies you told yourself, the little justifications you made for someone else's behavior, the excuses you made ... and you wonder how you could - why you would - do that to yourself? when someone is so clearly not looking out for your best interests, shouldn't it become even more your responsibility to protect yourself, instead of enabling the other person in his efforts to treat you like sh-t? and even when everything is over and done and you've beat yourself up for being so stupid and you've cried and your eyes are swollen and it's time to move on with life ... do you wonder why you're still so sad?

can i have a "P"?

2006-03-22T21:07:00.000-08:00

that "P" would be for procrastination, something i am oh, so good at it.

currently, i am procrastinating from:

1. writing my global warming article

2. dealing with the chunky booties

3. answering work emails that i should have answered before i left work

4. doing the dishes (i have a serious hatred for dirty dishes. i mean, i generate plenty of 'em. but i hate hate hate making them clean again.)

so in the spirit of aiding and abetting myself, i have some pictures from the hilarious italian dinner i told you about a few days ago:

ARGHH ... the pictures won't upload! they're apparently the wrong file extension or some such thing? even though they're .jpg just like all my other pictures! double argh!

well that certainly adds to the frustration of the day. in other frustrating news, i started carissa's booties for the fourth time ... and ripped them out. i've finally figured out the right number of stitches to cast on (24) and i have a vague sense of how i want to make them (bastardized sock pattern) ... but they keep turning out like crap. i'm doing the cuff in a 2x2 rib, and i keep getting the dreaded "ladder" in the transition between my knit and my purl stitches. why, why does this happen to me? it's driving me crazy.

bungled booties

2006-03-19T18:49:00.000-08:00

the weather in san francisco has finally turned a corner. the past two days have been gloriously sun-filled and almost even warm. three cheers for sunny weather! (i might be weirdly weather obsessed).

the past couple days have been hectic, hilarious and super fun. my friend moira flew into town from d.c. this past wednesday ... i haven't seen her in almost a year, since crunk 2005 (don't ask). unfortunately, i wasn't a huge amount of fun for her time in the city, since i was juggling work, an article, and an ever-growing stress level. but things started to turn around on friday when my other friend carissa (i mean, i have more than two friends ... but moira and carissa were the only two who feature prominently in the past few days) drove up from santa cruz. we went out and pretended to be irish (moira didn't have to pretend), had a few beers, saw another friend ... then on saturday, we drove down to santa cruz. even though santa cruz is only an hour plus away, it always feels like going on vacation when i go there. we had a totally fun time, cruised around downtown, i bought a pair of green vans that carissa and moira made me wear out of the store.

the hilarious part of the evening started at dinner ... i'm not sure exactly how to describe dinner except that it involved an italian restaurant run by a crazy owner/chef man who may or not be permanently on acid, a crazycrazy 15-woman bachelorette party, a crazycrazy 10-person italian exchange student party, a disco ball, three bottles of wine, lotsa pasta, side pony tails, and belting janis joplin at the top of our lungs using plastic forks as microphones.

the knitting part of the weekend involved attempting to make booties for carissa. she originally requested these about a week or so ago, with no instruction other than that they be teal. i was thinking felted wool. good thing i checked with carissa because she was thinking anything but.

we stopped at imagiknit before leaving the city on saturday and the first thing she said when we walked into the store was "i don't like wool."

well that certainly stopped me in my tracks. not liking wool? in carissa's defense, i don't think that she HATES hates wool ... she just wasn't thinking wool for her booties. so i readjusted, we moved over to the cotton/etc. room and carissa found a yarn she loves:

it's big baby by muench yarns. the colors are really pretty tealy, purply. it's really soft and seems fairly easy to knit with.

the problem, of course, is that the only patterns i've ever read for booties have been for felted booties. i mean, there must be a way to kind of smush these around so that they work for non-feltable microfiber acrylic, right? well, after three failed attempts last night, i'm feeling a little discouraged.

i'm trying to knit them in the round, using two circs, in a sort of abbreviated sock way. but the yarn is pretty chunky, and it just wasn't working for me. (my knitting also looked like crap, but that's a whole separate issue.). so i ripped out all three attempts. needless to say, i'm feeling a little frustrated. any suggestions?

ps - this might be the longest post ever. whoops.

rainy sunday

2006-03-12T10:31:00.000-08:00

i don't know how many of you compulsively check the weather - or how many of you are in the bay area, and are therefore experiencing the same weather as i am. but the weather in san francisco is MISERABLE right now. i know that i've become a little bit of a weather wimp in the five years that i've lived out here. once i was able to endure new england winters with barely a whimper. now the temperature drops below 50, and i run for hat, scarf, gloves, and winter jacket.

all that aside ... it is officially freezing here. okay, okay maybe not officially freezing, but it's pretty damn cold. in fact, there was snow just north of the golden gate bridge on friday. yes, that's right: snow. um, i live in california for a reason. actually, i live here for a lot reasons, but one of them is definitely to avoid snow.

you'd think with all this cold weather, i'd be wrapping myself in wool and knitting like a maniac, right? well, there again, we have a little bit of a problem. i'm currently working on my first-ever piece of freelance writing ... and i'm starting to feel a wee bit overwhelmed. in over my head, maybe? like i have no freaking clue what i'm doing and i have no idea why my friend amanda thought she should take a chance on me?

so instead of knitting, i've been immersing myself in background reading on global warming and climate change and all the horrible things we people do to the environment and the lack of good things that the government is doing to correct for all the previously mentioned bad things ... and as i'm reading all this (and attempting to write something about it), i look out the window at the horrible weather and i read about the snow, SNOW, in california and i hear that it's practically balmy back on the east coast ... and it all slowly comes together (not the article, mind you, just the global warming bits).

2006-03-08T17:13:00.000-08:00

That's me and my mom. It's her birthday today and she may want to kill me for posting a photo of her in her pajamas but I like it and everyone needs a little embarrassment on their birthday, right? So there she is.
My mom is great for alot of things - I have decided to list a couple (there's a knitting theme, here).

1. I can call her pretty much any time of the day with a knitting question and she has the answer. And if she doesn't have the answer she responds with "well, it just doesn't matter" or "why not just knit something else?". Both good answers.

2. Once I called her from a knitting shop in need of a pattern for a cardigan. I had my computer and a nearby coffee shop with wireless. What'd she do? Scan the pattern and email it to me so I could buy the yarn - RIGHT THEN AND THERE. She understands.

3. She has given me support by telling me over and over that socks aren't that hard and that it's easy to turn a heel.

4. She waited patiently when I started getting back into knitting. I started off by crocheting, she mentioned a couple of times how much better knitting was but calmly waited until I made the realization.

5. She is willing to pick up unfinished sweaters from 1983 and finish them.

6. She keeps unfinished sweaters for 23 years.

7. She taught me the importance of a stash. That's what I learned on - her leftover yarn that I would knit into squares of garter stitch. Along with a stash she also taught me the importance of attics and closets...the perfect homes for the stash.

8. She is always willing to push herself and learn new things..Latvian Mittens? No problem. Vintage Socks? No big deal. Last year she had a ten year old computer and no camera. Now? She blogs her digital photos onto her computer over wireless. Did I mention the marathon?

9. Her clicking needles really are the sound that we all find calming.

10. She's my mom.

Happy Birthday SuperBon!

bad days lead to good things

2006-03-05T21:12:00.000-08:00

my life has been a little underwhelming lately. yes, i do mean under, not over. don't get me wrong - i'm totally overwhelmed, but by some very underwhelming things. my job? not that exciting, but totally overwhelming. still having a christmas tree in my living room on the fifth day of march? bo-ring. but somehow overwhelming at the same time. row 44 of the body of rogue? same ole, same ole. but overwhelming enough that i haven't been able to make myself pick it up in over a week.

that's right, i said. i'm find rogue both boring and overwhelming. at the same time. how is that possible, you ask? well, the bulk of the sweater is plain, old stockinette. (that would be the boring part) however, since there are cable panels running up each side of the sweater, i am completely, totally tied to my chart and can't finish a single round without consulting it. (that, my friends, would be the overwhelming part)

so i've been in a little bit of a stalemate with my knitting over the past week or two. i didn't want to knit rogue, but felt horribly guilty picking up anything else. so i knit NOTHING.

enter friday, march 3. otherwise known as "the worst day of my life." (yes, i've always been this melodramatic, just ask my parents). okay, okay, it probably wasn't the worst day of my life, but it ranked right up there. (i would also like to acknowledge that even if it were the worst day of my life, i'm pretty damn lucky if that's what counts as the worst (do you think i could use more parentheticals in this posting?(does anyone know if you're supposed to put the punctuation on the inside or the outside of the parenthetical?))).

anyway, back to worst day ever. so i survived the day, obviously, but come saturday afternoon i was still feeling kinda sad. i thought to myself, if you could do anything to make yourself feel better, what would it be? and then it hit me - go to imagiknit, obviously!

i took myself to imagiknit posthaste, indulged in a little yarn and pattern book therapy, and came away with the following therapeutic aids:

ryc classic beach - "Shot on location along the shingle coastline of Kent in England, this collection features designs for summer days relaxing & playing by the sea, beach barbeques, fish & chips in the rain, skimming stones, and walks along the beach." doesn't that sound dreamy? the patterns aren't bad either.

sensational knitted socks by charlene schurch. this book is AMAZING. i've been wanting to dive into sock knitting for awhile but have been totally intimidated by the small needles, the number of needles, the small yarn ... this book breaks it down step by step. it also gives directions for using the two circular method of knitting in the round.

which is why i bought some trekking xxl and two circular needles. i'm about two inches in on my first sock. i'm obsessed. and i'm feeling much better.

pure gold

2006-02-28T14:31:00.000-08:00

well, maybe we didn't exactly make it to the finish line but i think that the wonder girls strode hand in hand into the olympic stadium and took our own sort of gold medal. the one where you realize that some of the those projects that you tuck away 23 years ago are actually finishable, that however hard 19 pages of pattern looks to you in the beginning that by taking step by step, stitch by stitch you can make something really beautiful, and when 14 cables for every row seems unbelievably f*%!ing hard and painstakingly slow but actually makes something unbelievably cool.
ladies, we did it.
i'm holding my tiny cable needle above my head.
(soon to be brought back down to finish said cables, but...details.)

2006-02-25T15:42:00.000-08:00

Here is a photo of Men's Argyle AFTER I cleaned up the tangled mess -this was taken last weekend. PLease be assured that the photo is of the inside of the sweater.

Cheerio!

YES,YES,YES!!!

2006-02-25T15:41:00.000-08:00

YES,YES,YES!!!

I'can t believe it-I just cast off the last stich on the front of the Men's Arglye. Tonite I'm taking a break & knitting socks-but early tomorrow I head back to the sweater &amp; do the neckband & tie in the ends. I'm celebrating with a nice smooth glass of Scotch.

facing facts

2006-02-25T11:37:00.000-08:00

just like sasha cohen knew as soon as she landed on her tush that she was not going to be a gold medalist, i'm starting to face the fact that i will not finish rogue by the 2pm deadline tomorrow. i've made peace with this and will move to the sidelines gracefully to cheer on my fellow knitting olympians as they race for gold.

maybe four years from now, i'll get to be one of those human interest interludes: "charis flamed out early in the 2006 knitting olympics, after tackling a pattern beyond her normal degree of difficulty. but now in these 2010 games, she's back and ready to finish what she started four long years ago."

don't read too much into that last statement. even though i will not be finishing rogue by 2pm tomorrow, i do plan to finish it at some point before 2010 (like december 31, 2009).

on another, non-knitting topic, does anyone else think that dick button is the biggest jerk EVER? i mean, that's great, dicky, that you won a medal back in 1948. but does that really give you license to rip apart every skater that sets foot on the ice? last time i checked, these people were OLYMPIANS which means, even if they don't perform at their absolute best, they're still better than 99.5% of the population. at least scott hamilton is there to balance out the commentary. jeez.

The finish line is up ahead

2006-02-25T10:54:00.000-08:00

Don't have much time to post because the finish line is up ahead! The Men's Argyle is so close to being finished. Plans are to sit by the fire & knit,knit,knit! I' at the neckline-about 2 inches to go & then knit the neckband, then sew it together & then weave it all of the damn loose ends. Gotta run the yarn is calling me. No time for photos-maybe next week.

slainte

2006-02-17T11:12:00.000-08:00

thanks to charis...i HAVE PHOTOS. when i was taking these photos. i noticed how wonderfully irish-like i will look after i finish my cables. it looks quite aran sweaterish and it's a wonderful green (the photos don't do the color justice). so...while charis is sipping on scotch, i will have a belly full of jameson or guiness, sure to fill up the green cables.
me dear cables:

and a horrendous upclose pic. don't look too close, you might find some cable forwards where some cable backs should be:

scotch and golf

2006-02-17T10:30:00.000-08:00

i am an incredibly loyal reader of the new yorker. it is my all-time favorite publication, i eagerly await its arrival each week, and i would lovelovelove to write for it one day.

occasionally, as a subscriber, i get invited to these "events." the invitations are always a little vague, and it's never really clear what the event actually is ... so i've never gotten around to going to one. on tuesday, however, i got an emailed invitation to a night of "humor on the course," an event co-sponsored by the new yorker and glenlivet. again, very vague, but i surmised that the evening had something to do with scotch and golf. (i'm very quick, you know, can't get anything by me) i immediately called my friend dan, one of the biggest fans of both scotch and golf that i know, and we decided to attend.

we had no idea what to expect. we certainly did not expect what we found:

a large empty warehouse space converted into on one half a men's club-style bar, replete with big comfy leather chairs and on the other half a nine-hole golf course (albeit a short golf course but there were sand traps and water hazards).

everything was free - the scotch, the golf, the shrimp (oh yes, they had food too). AND we got a gift bag from the new yorker that includes the latest issue and a book of golf cartoons from the new yorker.

it was amazing. we also made friends with the marketing woman, and she said we can back any night next week. genius.

needless, i haven't made much progress on rogue.

picabo

2006-02-16T11:15:00.000-08:00

charis - thanks for the shout out. i just WISH i was hiding away and knitting away on cables and racing secretly towards the finish line, just like picabo. steadfastly sticking to my training regime, getting enough sleep, eating the right diet, stretching and flexing the approproiate muscles and tendons involved in my event. instead of picabo - i'm acting more like bode miller, drinking a few glasses of wine every night, picking up the cables every once and a while and expecting a clean sweep when i just haven't trained. when i tire of cables, i put them down. hmm. this doesn't sound like a true olypmian.

and then when i DO get on a roll - i start swapping the C4B with a C4F.

BUT i have great plans for the coming weekend. in the spirit of past presidents (not current one) i hereby annouce that i will pick those needles back up, finish the back of this sweater and just keep.moving.forward....

twist-a-licious

2006-02-16T00:16:00.000-08:00

so far, my plan to ignore the mis-twisted cables is working. i've even shown the fledgling sweater to two people, and they didn't notice a thing. (in the spirit of full disclosure, one of those people was my slightly drunk-at-the-time, non-knitting boy ex-roomie, and the other, while a knitter, is a very, very new knitter. details.) in addition to ignoring the glaring mistake, i've also made some good - and correct - progress on rogue. i'm on round 48ish (i could say for sure if i wasn't too lazy to get up out of bed and check ... in my defense, it's freaking freezing in san francisco right now and my house has no heat) out of a total of 88 for the body.

for awhile i was in love with my cables, but that love has been slowly morphing into a love-hate thing. my last knit stitch heading into each cable panel was getting super loose, and it was really bothering me, so i started doing this trick/technique where you bring your yarn up between the needles instead of down on your first purl stitch after a knit section. does that make any sense? it makes that switch a little tighter. so it's getting better, but there's a whole section that's a little wonky.

overall, i think i'm getting a little faster at the pattern. not necessarily fast enough to finish by the 26th, but faster.

in other, breaking news, the top question of the day is: where's maggie? maggie made a quick break from the gates at the beginning of the games but has been knitting on the down low for the past four days. she could be planning a sneak attack on the front of grace, or she could have gone cable-crazy and made an abrupt mid-olympics event switch to join the u.s. curling team. we'll be sure to keep you posted - whether it's with knitting or with curling, we're sure maggie will be gracefully triumphant in her dash for gold.

misery

2006-02-14T18:06:00.000-08:00

i'm literally running out the door to meet friend's for dinner (a sort of anti-valetine's day celebration, if you will) but i just discovered that i have made (insert dramatic music here) a mistake.

i'm not sure why i'm surprised. i should be thrilled that i made it through the first 30 or so rows of the pattern without a mistake. but still.

anyway, back the mistake ... i have mis-crossed my cables. i was supposed to do cable 5 left and i did cable 5 right (or maybe it was the other way around, i dunno, clearly having some trouble with the whole "chart" thing). i didn't even realize the mistake until i was another 5 rounds past it.

i just couldn't face ripping back those 5 long, long rounds of 180+ stitches each in superduper clingy wool. so i forged ahead. i thought about doing all of the cables backwards, but wasn't sure how that would work out later in the pattern ... so i'm just going to pretend that's the way it's supposed to be. and everyone else out there is going to have to help me out in this delusion and pretend that's the way it's supposed to be too. that means if you've seen another rogue with cables neatly crossed in the right direction, and then you see my rogue - i don't want to hear it.

sigh.

keeping on keeping on

2006-02-12T23:10:00.000-08:00

we're coming to the end of day three out here on the west coast, and much progress has been made. some of this progress is good - i've made it through 24 rounds of the pattern, cables and all. i'm actually pretty pleased with how my cables are turning out. i don't know that they really deserve a 10.0, but for my first attempt, they're not half bad. see for yourself:

well, bugger. i feel like you can't see the cables at all in those pictures. so much for my digital photo abilities ... i'll try to figure it out tomorrow and will hopefully have better pics soon.

some progress has been ... less good. that would be the progress i'm making towards being a totally reclusive insane person. it was 70 degrees and sunny today in san francisco. did i take advantage of the weather? no, i did not. i sat on my couch, and knit, ALL DAY (which is a little embarassing to admit because based on the progress some other rogue knitters are making, i should probably be farther along than i am given the number of hours i put in today. sigh.). my roommate gave me some strange looks and made several comments about how nice it was outside. i just muttered something about cable 5 twist 3 backwards upside down and sideways. after that, he snuck out of the house and hasn't been seen since.

i was feeling a little guilty about sitting inside on such a day. i was trying to self-justify in various ways - i mean, i'm from connecticut, if i still lived there i wouldn't be able to leave the house! but then i realized what it really came down to and i said - out loud (see earlier comment about becoming reclusive and insane) - "real olympians make sacrifices. i can too."

oh charis.

death to twisted stockinette

2006-02-12T01:51:00.000-08:00

day two of the knitting olympics. day one for charis (because i'm the world's biggest slacker and just couldn't get around to doing anything on the official day one). what i've learned so far:

1. i hate twisted stockinette stitch
2. fighting with your yarn and your needles while attempting to execute twisted stockinette stitch over the course of several/many hours will make your hands hurt. a lot.

but with my "forward progress at all times" motto in mind, i pushed forward and made it through the hem-facing. gooooooooooooo team charis! i'm now into the main bit of the body and am two rows in on the cable repeat. those first two rows were easy. the rows look like they get progressively harder. given my "sleep is always more fun than swearing at your cable needle" motto, i gave up and got in bed.

under the new, complex, multi-part knitting scoring system, scores for the day are:

rogue: 36.7456
charis: 28.765

that wraps up today's portion of the competition. tune in tomorrow for more, exciting developments in the rogue/charis face off. back to you, bob.

Wonder Girl Knits

2006-02-11T13:27:00.000-08:00

The Argyle Combined Event

My event has begun and so far all is well. i started my argyle event last night. spent most of the opening ceremonies tying up loose ends. You would not believe the mess I was in. I guess I need to explain...my Olympic Event is to FINISH the Men's Argyle sweater that I started for "my guy" in 1983!! I discovered the neglected knitting bag in the attic and decided this was to be my challenge. So after many hours of untangling yarn, tying off loose ends & enlarging the chart so I could see it I have finally begun to actual KNIT! I'm sitting here watching the Nordic Combined Event and have completed two rows. The sweater is a beauty-it's a good thing "my guy" didn't gain any weight over the past 23 years.

Also wanted to let everyone know I had a great time last Monday night with some very talented ladies-I'll blog more about that later-need to knit now-but I can say that one of those ladies was THE HARLOT and we can't thank her enought for this KNitting Olympic Experience.

let the insanity begin

2006-02-11T12:22:00.000-08:00

here we are, day two of the knitting olympics ... and i'm already behind! aaah! somehow, despite the fact that i've known the knitting olympics were starting at 2p yesterday for, oh, about a month, i forget to get the needles i needed. whoopsie. but i made a frantic run to the store this morning and got all the necessary supplies. so a mere twenty-four hours after the official beginning of the k.o., my personal insanity is beginning. bring. it. on.

i'm not sure why maggie thinks we can hold out on the drunken knitting olympics until day 7. at the rate i'm going, i'll be there by tomorrow.

more later. right now, i need to figure out what twisted stockinette stitch is.

you know the knitting olympics are getting out of hand when....

2006-02-10T14:24:00.000-08:00

well feel free to come up with your own answer for that one.
my answer: The Knitting Olympics Drinking Game

C'mon Charis, you know that's going to be us around Day 7.
So with needles raised, we're off.
What have I done yet? Well, I finally bought the needles for Grace. And more cables needles because those things are so darn small that I already lost the first couple that I was using to swatch. This could be interesting folks...
I might take a nap to prepare for a late night of knitting.
How is everyone else doing?

woefully behind

2006-02-09T08:23:00.000-08:00

as february 10th looms large, i have to admit that i am woefully behind on ... well, on almost everything. i have not finished the following items:

1. the skinny sweater
2. my brother's scarf
3. the wedding blanket
4 & 5. cute baby brady's sweater (i gave that two numbers because it's barely even started.)

i did manage to finish one thing:

matt's hat (i'll post a picture later ... my digital camera is momentarily misplaced)

however, the recipient of my knitting largess has decided that he doesn't really like the hat all that much, he can't exactly put his finger on why, he just doesn't like it, thanks but no thanks, can i have another please?

well. i never. the INGRATITUDE.

however, given the other event looming large in my life - rogue & the knitting olympics - i might just have to accept being woefully behind for the next two weeks.

i'm apparently taking the same attitude towards rogue that i take towards many other competitive events in my life - don't train at all, it's all about forward progress, you'll finish it somehow. this has worked for three marathons. i have high hopes for rogue.

on the road again.

2006-02-05T22:02:00.000-08:00

and i think i can wait to get on the road. as charis mentioned, i was staying up in marin county last week and up in sonoma couty this weekend and back down to san francisco this week. a week's worth of clothes are backed into one backpack and yarn enough for two sweaters, one hat and one scarf are backed into the other three bags. and did i mention my spinning wheel? and the wool? haa. not only does trevor have a great amount of understanding for knitting talk - he also doesn't question me (too much) for carrying eighteen bags of yarn around with me while we are waiting to make a fulltime move up to sonoma county.

in other news...i think my spinning is getting better. i mean it's still a bit thick here and thin here, but overall i'm getting more even.
pictures? i just wish i knew where my camera is during all the craziness - supposedly packed away in a box somewhere which i will find in three months. my size 8 dpns? oh, they're right here.

and in better news - i made a decision on the Grace color:

I chose color 4007. I know it doesn't mean much according to this picture...but more wonderful cables of this to come!
We'll have to get SuperBon to post soon - word on the street is that she might be hanging with the harlot sometime soon. SuperBon??
Oh yeah - Trevor (aka. Kid Mohair, his new street name) is thinking about joining the Olympics as well. He was wondering if he could crochet? Is that allowed? Or is that the equivalent of the Jamaican Bobsled Team?

slow as molasses in january

2006-02-03T13:27:00.000-08:00

finally, a day off! i know, i know - i'm a HUGE slacker for only working four days a week. but man, those four days felt looooooooong this week. being sick did not help the situation at all, especially since i couldn't call in sick to work because i sort of, accidentally, maybe called in sick the week prior when i wasn't exactly sick at all.

i realized that, in my speedy gonzales post earlier this week, i forgot to mention the biggest excitement of my whirlwind weekend in willytown. i saw superbon! i meant to call her for coffee, but then the whirlwindiness of everything just blew my plans away ... but she came and found me anyway! (those of you who haven't been to w-town will not understand how it could be that easy; those of you who have spent some time in w-town will understand that we probably would have seen each other even if we were actively trying to avoid it) sadly, i had left my knitting in the car, but superbon showed me the mittens pattern she's working on, and needless to say, i'm in awe. not just at the knitting, but by the fact that she is able to read the teeny, tiny, itsybitsy chart. anyway, it was great to see you, superbon! i can't wait until you're out to visit in april.

as i might have mentioned once or twice, i've been feeling a little sickly this week. i've also been dealing with houseguests who aren't mine. lucky for sick, cranky charis, maggie has been staying at a gorgeous, amazing place in marin and invited me up last night. we made irish beef stew (well, that was mostly maggie. i just drank the leftover guinness.), drank wine, and knit. trevor was there as well, and it is just absolutely amazing how much knitting talk the man can withstand without even batting an eye. he's a keeper, mags.

much progress was made on the skinny sweater. i have about 2 inches to go before i switch colors. i think. i mean, i have 2 inches to go if i'm making the front dark green part the same length as the back dark green part. but for some reasons the pattern tells me to make the front 3/4 of an inch shorter than the back. is there some advanced knitter reason for this of which i am unawares? the pattern is from a suss cousins book, and i've noticed a few, well, complaints about the accuracy of her patterns. so in the absence of any other direction, i'm going to assume the length difference is a mistake and knit the front the same as the back.

zoom zoom

2006-02-01T13:47:00.000-08:00

just wanted to post a quick note to let everyone know that i did make it back from my whirlwind trip to massachusetts (i'm sure you were all waiting with bated breathe for that one). however, due to a number of factors - jet lag, inconsiderate roommates, the weather, getting sick - i've done NOTHING since getting back except pretend to work and pretend to sleep (the inability to do real work is directly correlated with my inability to get real sleep).

in an attempt to get my life back in order, i have canceled my plans for the evening and plan to curl up on the couch with a mug of tea, my skinny sweater, and law & order.

also ...

2006-01-25T23:43:00.000-08:00

i just want to give a shout-out to amber who has left not one, but two comments over the past week! i love comments! three cheers for amber!

ups and downs

2006-01-25T23:17:00.000-08:00

the past week has been exceedingly ... emotional. last friday, i received some incredibly sad news about a friend of mine from high school, the kind of sad, horrifying news that is difficult to process and accept. since hearing this news, i've been thinking a lot about high school. i know many people who hated high school, and have always felt lucky that i am not one of them. there were moments of teenage angst, of course, but i genuinely enjoyed my high school years. a large part of the enjoyment stemmed from the close knit group of friends and teammates of which i was a part. even though i have lost touch over the years with many of those people, my sense of a shared community with them remains very strong.

i feel lucky to have been a part of such a community when i was in high school ... and feel incredibly lucky to have developed an incredibly strong and supportive community of friends out here in san francisco. but sometimes i think that i take this for granted, i assume that my little community will always be there. and maybe it will. but it can't hurt to take a little time out of each day not just to be thankful for the friends and family you have, but also to tell them how much they mean to you.

on the better news front, i received a very exciting call from a friend last night. this friend works for an on-line policy journal of sorts which is looking for someone to write an article on carbon markets. and as of this moment, it's looking like that someone will be me! i know this probably doesn't sound very exciting to all of you BUT given that i desperately need & want journalism experience and that i want to be writing about energy-related topics ... this call was like manna from heaven. i still don't know all the details, but my friend is sending me some stuff in an email and then we'll meet to discuss early next week. yay!

after spending the day reviewing the top (and not so top) news stories of 2005 for this test i'm taking tomorrow, i definitely needed some kick-back-and-chill knitting time. i also need to maximize my maggie time, because she's leaving me as of next week. so, she came over with cheesy movies in hand, and we spent a solid six hours on the couch knitting. the result of which is:

the first four inches or so of the front of the sweater. forward progress is being made. some of you may be asking why i have two balls of the exact same yarn attached to the sweater. after tangling the dangling yarn at least eight times during each row, i was asking myself the same question. the simple answer is that i will be connecting the two sides after about nine inches, and then sewing a nine-inch zipper in at the very end so that i can leave the bottom of the sweater open or closed. it sounds so easy, doesn't it? check back with me on that a week or two from now.

tomorrow night, i'm hopping a plane bound for williamstown, and i couldn't be more excited. i'm getting to see my parents, a bunch of swimmer friends from college, and the one, the only ... superbon! i'm plotting a meeting between superbon and my mom in the hopes of luring my mom in to ranks of the knitting obsessed.

the skinny.

2006-01-24T11:53:00.000-08:00

ok, i have begun to narrow down my yarn options for knitting Grace by Debbie Bliss and i have come up with the following yarns and colors to choose from.
the following yarns fit my gauge.
Andean Silk by Knitpicks - a blend of alpaca, silk, and merino (read: heaven)

in either Lettuce

or Slate

or Cinnamon

My second yarn choice is Pastaza by Cascade made of llama and wool (you know i love those llamas).

In Spruce

or Artichoke

I have narrowed it down to five. I won't tell you what I am leaning towards as of now - mostly because I don't really know myself. Any opinions?

wish it was sunday

2006-01-23T21:24:00.000-08:00

mondays are the worst. anyone who claims to like mondays is lying through his teeth. mondays ruin the start of a perfectly good week by forcing you to go to work. even worse than a normal monday is a monday on which you have an evening meeting where no one can stick to the agenda so your hour-long meeting runs for two hours and you don't get home from work until 9pm. that kind of monday ... well, to be perfectly frank, that kind of monday just blows.

in case you were wondering, that's the kind of monday i just had.

but in an attempt to be a glass-half-full kind of gal, look at what came in the mail for me today:

my yarn for rogue! it's the fisherman yarns from barlett yarns in medium sheeps gray. i originally wanted to go for the plum heather, but was talked into this color by maggie and ccd. i'm happy with my choice, and actually think that it is the perfect color for this type of sweater. here's a closer look:

i can't decide whether or not i'm nervous for rogue. on the one hand, the pattern is nineteen pages long. yes, that's right - nineteen pages. on the other hand, i've done a lot of the things in the pattern before, just not the cables and the short rows. but it's just knitting, right? i mean, how hard can it be? in case you were wondering, that was a rhetorical question - i don't really want to hear about just how hard it can, in fact, be.

moving on ... as promised, here is the finished back of the sweater:

i haven't blocked it yet, so it's rolling at all the edges, making it look even skinnier than it already is. i think it'll be about 18 inches across when it's blockced, though. is that very narrow? i think i need to start looking for a very tall, very skinny person to be the recipient of this sweater.

done!

2006-01-23T00:14:00.000-08:00

just kidding, i'm not done. well, not exactly. i'm certainly not done with any of the various projects i've pledged to finish by february 10th. truth be told, i didn't even do any work on them this weekend.

but i am done with the back of my sweater! yay! i'm worried that it's waywayway too long and waywayway too skinny, but am holding out for the wonders of blocking (i've never actually blocked anything before). i'm wondering whether i should block the parts of the sweater separately before seaming, or just wait and block the whole thing after seaming. various books say various things. any thoughts?

i need to post pictures, but i'm veryveryvery sleepy. seems to be a trend.

hold up.

2006-01-22T23:32:00.000-08:00

wait one second, i was just browsing some random knitting blogs and someone mentioned their "knitpicks" yarn. i had no idea what they were talking about. i googled it and came across this:

BEST ONLINE YARN STORE EVER

there are SO many reasons why this is a great shop. you can search for tons of different yarns - by many different topics (weight, color, content and probably more than i even know).
there has to be a catch.
and then i realize that they have a special section of natural wool in large skeins for dyeing.
there has to be a catch.
then i read there byline: "travelling the world to bring you affordable knitting"
since when is knitting affordable?
there has to be a catch. there yarns seem great, cheap and great.
anyone know of this? i'm so curious and am off to search for a yarn for THE SWEATER (cabled grace, if you were wondering).

row by row

2006-01-21T10:14:00.000-08:00

isn't there a song? something about making gardens grow? anyhoo, i thought it was an appropriate title for a post on sweater progress - which is definitely growing:

i finished the dark green portion, started on light green portion, AND did my armhole shaping:

the directions on the armhole shaping weren't all that clear (i.e., they asked me to bind off stitches at the end of a row), but through application of common sense and a phone call to mags, i perservered. now i just keep knitting for a few more inches (probably closer to five inches, but who's counting), shape the neck, bind off, and then i'm done!! with that back, that is. i still have the front and two sleeves. but i also have a cross-country trip next weekend, so lots of knitting time on the plane.

in other, non-knitting, news, last night was book club. it was the usual racuous affair, with yummy matt-made food, some discussion about the book, and a whole lot more discussion not about the book. this is my favorite picture from the night:

and this is what i did shortly after taking that picture:

i feel asleep. on the couch, in the middle of raging book club. i would blame it on all the late hours i was keeping this past week because of a certain sweater obsession, but this is the third book club in a row where i have fallen asleep. so it must be something else. could it be, is it possibly that ... i'm growing old?

call me crazy

2006-01-19T18:59:00.000-08:00

i've always considered myself a smidge left of normal - and have always thought that it was a good thing. i mean, quirks are what make people interesting, right? well, my friends, i've stepped it up to a whole new level this week. as of monday, i was a knitter who had completed nothing more complicated than a small, garter stitch baby sweater (knit all in one piece so there were no seams).

that was monday. as of today, i am a knitter who is compulsively knitting her first ever sweater AND who has signed up for the yarn harlot's knitting olympics. how did this happen.

now that i'm about 14 inches in on sweater #1, i felt sufficiently experienced to commit to knitting rogue for the knitting olympics. to fully appreciate the depths of my insanity, let's examine a few pictures. from the front:

and from the side:

hmm. yes. well. another brilliant decision by yours truly. have i mentioned that i've never actually completed an adult-size sweater before? oh wait, oh wait, did i also remember to mention that i've never officially done cables before?

i'm screwed. because in addition to being overly ambitious, i happen to be insanely competitive. which means that now that i've committed to this sweater, there is no backing down. there is no quitter in charis. there may be a mildly insane knitter in charis, but there is no quitter. it's just me and you, rogue. let's see who blinks first.

on a slightly less crazy note, i'm actually making good progress on sweater #1. this could be because i sat on my couch last night for over five hours doing nothing but knitting on sweater #1, but that's really a minor detail. anyway, here's proof of my progress:

it's a little rolled up in this picture, but i'm at about 14 inches. i get to switch colors at 15.75 inches. look at me, a regular sweater machine.

a certain someone has pointed out that i may owe another certain someone a certain christmas present from, oh, 2004. hehem. yes, i am a wee bit behind on some of my projects. although i seem to have just taken on more knitting than i know what to do with. despite that, i pledge to finish - by February 10th at 2pm Eastern - all ongoing projects that are intended as presents (this last bit is an extremely important caveat. otherwise, i'd be up against yet another impossible deadline.). at last count, this means i need to finish:

1. a scarf for my brother
2. a hat for matt harris

i'm starting to feel like i have more things on my knitting to-do list than i do on my work to-do list.

in training.

2006-01-19T13:33:00.000-08:00

so the training has begun. charis and i have decided to partake in the harlot's olympic knitting event. 16 days to push yourself to create something amazing out of wool. something that is great. something that is a challenge. something warm.
i have decided to take on this:

Grace by Debbie Bliss. I am still in the midst of figuring out how to afford all of the yarn that all those cables are going to take. I think I have decided on Cascade - but not on the color. Suggestions?
The reason this is a big challenge for me is a couple of reasons.
1. SWEATER. I have succesfully finished ONE sweater. Hmm...
2. CABLES. I have never made a cable. The first time I met the yarlot, she taught me how to cable on a sock without a cable needle, but i don't remember. Now every book I read uses a cable needle. Hmmm...
3. CAST-ON. Supposedly there is some special cast-on for this sweater (still don't have the pattern, so don't know the specifics) and it took one knitter/blogger over an HOUR to cast on just the back of the sweater. Hmm...
4.TIME. My first sweater took six months and now I have agreed to knit one in 16 days. Hmm...
5. COLLARS. Hmm...

Ok, so more than a few reasons that this will be a challenge.

In other news I AM SPINNING. I am addicted to spinning on my new Ashford and although my yarn is incredibly uneven - I am proud of it. So proud of it that I brought it out with me on Saturday night to a house party. When conversation lulled, I presented everyone with my yarn. They didn't really get it...and I repeated MY yarn. My fellow knitters were incredibly supportive and excited - and others were just confused.
Hmm...

helping others.

2006-01-18T09:15:00.000-08:00

so there i am sitting in my favorite coffee shop yesterday tap tapping away on my computer when i notice the most interesting thing. a young man knitting. this man was dressed in all black with black spiked hair and blacked fingerless gloves that were strapped together with metal chains. he had pink fingernails. and he was knitting. well, he was trying to knit what looked like a purple pastel yarn into a scarf. he was on his first row. and as we all know - for a beginner - the first row can be hard. so i kept casually glancing over watching him struggle to work the first stitch - putting it on the needle, dropping it, putting it on the wrong one, dropping it again.

his hands started to shake.

i decided, like the generous knitter i am (kind of) to offer some help. i mean, what knitter in their right mind can watch the nervous shaky hands? (i would never admit that my first reaction was to grab said yarn out of the shaky hands and knit a few rows until we were all clear, never admit it) so i looked around and faced him head on. he looked up like a deer in headlights, his eyes twitching back and forth.

"umm, can i give you a hand, there?"
"no, i just, i just have to go"

at that, he gathered all of his black and metal belongings and ran out of the coffee shop.

maybe i was too abrupt in my thinking that he needed help? maybe he was scarred by an aggressive knitter/teacher in the past? maybe he had to go? maybe his hands weren't shaking at all and he was doing just fine and i simply wanted to take over?
oh well. i suppose not every knitter in public wants my help.

dilemma

2006-01-18T08:57:00.000-08:00

so here's my dilemma. yesterday, in an upsurge of knitting ambition, i went and purchased yarn for my first ever sweater. i then went back to maggie's and started knitting on said sweater. i then went back to my house and stayed up until 1:15 in the morning, continuing to knit on said sweater. i think it can be said that i'm in the early throes of an obsession with said sweater.

however, as some observant readers will recall, i still have three skeins left to go on the wedding blanket. some may also recall that i had been talking smack about finishing the blanket in time for my mini-reunion, reason being that the recipient was supposed to be there.

however, i have just learned that the recipient will not be at the reunion. hence, my dilemma: do i forge ahead with the wedding blanket regardless, or do i give in to my sweater obsession?

of course, the simple, obvious answer would be to spend an hour on one, an hour on the other. but that is just waaaaaaaaaaaaaay too rational for me.

no more excuses

2006-01-16T13:41:00.000-08:00

friends and fellow knitters. as of 6:45pm pacific this past saturday, january 14th, i no longer have an excuse to ignore my knitting and this blog. that, my friends, is because at 6:45pm this past saturday, i pressed the "submit" button for my very last grad school application (i say this is as if i applied to twenty program. i really only applied to four. but still, give me my moment of exhultation.)!! to say that i am experiencing intense and overwhelming feelings of relief is the understatement of the year.

the reason that i am just now posting this update is because as of 6:46pm this past saturday, january 14th, i started celebrating in a less yarny, more alcholic way. this then led to me spending most of yesterday on maggie's couch, pretending to do a number of things including knitting, watching a subtitled movie, reading knitting books for a new pattern, and thinking about helping maggie pack. while pretending to do all of these things, what i was really doing was counting down until i could take my next excedrin.

but now here i am. i'm back for good this time. no more extended vacations. i promise.

i'm also planning to get a lot more knitting done. as of yesterday, i picked the wedding blanket back up. i have three skeins left to go. my goal is to finish by the last weekend in january. i'm heading to williamstown that weekend for a mini-swimming reunion, and the intended recipient of said wedding blanket is rumored to be planning to attend as well. so if i finish the blanket in time, i can bring it with me, thus avoiding paying for shipping (by using the hand delivery method, i will also avoid many hours of intense anxiety about the u.s. postal service's ability to get the blanket across the country without losing it).

in other knitting news, maggie and i have a new knitting club! we've held two meetings, and have already experienced massive growth in number of members (we also lost a member between the first and second meeting, but it wasn't because of the knitting. it was because she moved to colorado.). my friend ccd, one of the charter members of knitting club, is showing all the signs of being bitten by the knitting bug. she already has several projects going on at once and really, really likes buying yarn.

i know this posting is a little text heavy. i promise with my next post, i'll get back into the picture swing. although, after seeing the amazing things that superbon has been producing recently, i'm a little embarassed for my efforts. sigh.

oh, oh! this was the other thing ... the yarn harlot has just announced the "2006 Knitting Olympics" on her blog! i think i'm going to enter - mags, what do you think? you'll already be up in sonoma, but maybe we have a knitting olympics weekend - i'll come up, and we'll just knit all weekend.

A Few of My FAvorite Things!

2006-01-14T05:46:00.000-08:00

It is a rainy day here in New England-tough to get the energy together and go out and exercise so I thought I'd share a few of my favorite projects I've been working on. I managed to complete the two Christmas stockings for the bride & groom-the dates is 2005-their wedding year. It was fun working these stockings-large needles. I also was able to finish two pair of socks-size 1 needles.

Another project that I am very excited about is my Avon Breast Cancer Walk Project. I have committed to walk the two day event & raise $1800-along with MC Crochet. Last month I came across a great felted bag pattern & made a bag for myself-Received great reviews on it ! So I have decided to make up these bags & sell them to raise money for the cause. I'll post a photo soon. I already have 4 of them on needles!
Last week I was the mad knitter trying desperately to finish a baby blanket for a baby shower this week. Here is the finished product.

I have managed to visit several knitting shops in 2005-in Massachusetts, New York & California. There is fabulous yarn out there to satisfy our addition but I must confess I have a faavorite yarn shop. The yarn selection is beyond belief-the ideas are expansive but the best of all is the owner-Susan. She is welcoming and knows her stuff. The yarn shop is Adirondack Yarns in Lake Placid , New York. I manage to make a visit there at least once a month to increase my stash. In early December I stopped by to see what was waiting for me on the shelves and I was greeted by the following sign at the front door- Now this place knows GREAT BLOGS!

she's back!

2005-12-17T12:24:00.000-08:00

whoops. that was certainly a long absence from the blog. in my defense, i've been a wee bit consumed with grad school applications and have had no time to either knit or blog. i mean, i probably did have some time ... but the problem with something like grad school applications is that they are constantly hanging over your head. so whenever you're doing something that's not grad school applications, you feel guilty. for someone like myself, with a slightly overdeveloped guilt complex, that can spell disaster.

but here i am! one application down, three to go. i gave myself a week off from submitting the first one to starting the other three. and now, one week almost to the hour later, i am sitting down at my computer ... only to begin procrastinating immediately. whoops again.

anyway, enough about grad school. in knitting news ... well, like i said, i've been busy and feeling guilty. but i did pick up the blanket yesterday! does everyone remember the blanket? this would be the one that i started to may to give to my friend as a wedding present. whoops for the third time (do we sense a trend?). the blanket was taking FOREVER, and to be perfectly honest, was becoming a bit boring. one yarnover a row is just not enough to make all knit, all the time interesting. yesterday afternoon, however, after a tough four hours at work, i found myself in need of some mindless knitting. i spent a couple hours on it and am almost through the fourth skein. which means, my friends, that i am almost at the point where each row starts getting shorter. this is very, very exciting. for me, anyway.

in other news, the second annual wonder girl knits holiday spectacular was a smashing success. we sold a number of things, mostly thanks to our friend sandra who was having a GMAT-induced shopping breakdown. we did take pictures but they're all on maggie's camera. final whoops of the day.

alright, i'm off to be productive. or to curl up on my couch. details.

website is up!!

2005-12-09T21:59:00.000-08:00

check out:
Wonder Girl Knits

loose ends.

2005-12-09T10:24:00.000-08:00

i am sick of loose ends. charis and i have pulled out all of our goods and are having a little gathering this weekend (not so little, we titled it the WONDER GIRL KNITS SPECTACULAR). i realized that i had some fun pieces to sell...but i have the fun habit of finishing knitting, binding off and...that's it. i hate tying in loose ends. i hate it even more when i make a little hat with MANY different colors so there are what feels like 300 ends to tie in. so i sat down at kitchen table last night and went at it. around loose end #278, i realized that i was tying them TIGHTER and TIGHTER. unlike casually knitting the cutest baby dress ever, this just wasn't relaxing. even the wonderful feeling of holding up a finished piece up in front of me just wasn't satisfying enough...

so what does this mean?
i think it just confirms what i always thought...i am a **process** person. i enjoy the process of knitting, crochet, spining, dyeing. it's wonderful that i am being productive and creating and end up with a cool knitted good to keep someone warm...but what do i really get joy out of? the process. i love knotting together things in different shapes. i love doing it and once that step is done...i'm done. (there also might be something to do here with the fact that i have a hard time finishing/letting go of things, but we will ignore that and just keep talking about the *process*). so now i ponder - does this somehow affect my end product?

anyways...in other very exciting news, my loving parents are treating me to a VERY special xmas present. a spinning wheel. i get to make my own yarn. i now have to choose...which wheel to get? i have done some research and asked around. i am looking for something wonderful, easily transportable, can spin any yarn, and wonderful (did i mention that?). i want a piece that i will have my entire life. something that my grandchildren will remember me sitting by and making them yarn out of a big ball of hairy stuff, which gets put on needles, which makes them warm sweaters.
i am thinking about one of the two:
the ashford joy as reccommended by rachael:

OR the ashford traveller:

any thoughts? advice? tips out there???

turkeys and alpacas.

2005-11-29T16:32:00.000-08:00

or, just alpacas.
so i don't have any new finished projects to tell about. i have one mitten, one leg warmer, one half of a baby's dress, one sweater minus one arm.
i was home this past week where i saw super bon and her half baby blanket, her unfelted bag, her two christmas stockings that are only halfway done, and one recovering super donnie.
i have yet to catch up with charis, who i believe has one half of a cable baby cardigan, one half wedding blanket, one scarf minus flower and i am guessing the only thing she is looking to finish is her grad school applications, and you can't exactly blog those.
i might even have seen super pam with one half of a fleece artist sweater and wonder girl annie who has one sock.

so i bring us cheer with pictures of ridiculous alpacas.
i think i want one.

More photos

2005-11-04T20:54:00.000-08:00

I think I might make this work eventually!! Here is Super Mema at her crafts show in October. The hit of the show -fun fur flip flops!!

2005-11-04T17:01:00.000-08:00

Here is the photo of Super Mema

Superbon recovers!

2005-11-04T16:30:00.000-08:00

Believe it or not it is SUPERBON! Yes, I have recovered from my marathon-what an absolute thrill to run / walk 26.2 miles with your best friend & never run out of anything to talk about. When things were starting to get rough I'd turn to Pam & say, "Let's talk about our knitting!"
AS for my knitting-I have MANY projects on the needles.Right now I have 2 baby sweaters just waiting for buttons & a zipper. I have 4 pair of socks on needles, the Lucy bag waiting to be felted, yummy yarn from Fiber Artists waiting to be turned into a jacket, Irish wool half made up into mittens, just finished a comfy bulky baby blanket, cute little felted baby toy balls(still need to stuff & felt them) and a pile of stash so big you wouldn't believe it!!!! And I'm seriously thinking about going to a yarn shop tomorrow-a good one hour drive away!!

So check out my first attempt at downloading a photo! Guess I need some work here-anyway-this is a cute aby sweater I make for everyone new baby I know-this one was done in Debbie Bliss cashmerino-such luxury for a baby!! My second attempt to upload a photo & I missed again! -the smaller photo is of a pair of back zippered hooded baby sweaters for a set of twins-quick & easy-MC Crochet I made you a pink one just like it when you were a baby. More to come -this is fun!

return of the image

2005-11-04T14:36:00.000-08:00

first of all, so sorry for having been absent from the blog for so long. as mags noted, i just took the GREs on wednesday and have spent the past week or two frantically memorizing long lists of vocab words and trying to remember ninth grade algebra. none of this did me much good but at least the test is over. phew.

second of all, huge congrats to pam and bonnie for finishing the marathon! i'm really impressed and hope your legs are recovering well.

third of all, let us all celebrate the return of pictures!!! i FINALLY remembered to bring my camera home from work so will delight the crowds with some actual images of the things i've been blathering on about. first up, the cute little scarfy thing:

now some of you will remember that this is supposed to have a cute little flower doodad attached to it. after several frustrating attempts at the flower, i needed to put it away. i was just looking out for the yarn as one more failed attempt might have pushed me to commit yarnicide. that being said, maybe i'll pick the flower back up at some point. for right now, i'm trying to convince myself that i like it just as much without the flower.

next in the picture queue, the spoils of yesterday's trip to imagiknit:

when i got there, maggie was sitting on a couch surrounded by yarn. in fact, she had so much yarn that she had needed to borrow one of the shop's bags just to carry it all around. she was contemplating putting some of it back but, like a true enabler, i put a quick stop to that line of thinking and actually encouraged her to pick up a few more skeins. clearly, i didn't do too bad myself.

when we got back to my place, we settled down to a good night of knitting, desperate housewives and under the tuscan sun, with a side of yummy thai food and diet coke. my roommate dan and maggie's boyfriend trevor passed all this up to go to a raging hip hop concert. hmmm. anyhoo, the end result of the evening was this:

one mitten! yay! it felt really good to actually finish something - i even wove in all my ends! (and yes, i am aware that for this mitten to actually be useful i need to finish a second mitten. details.) i got the pattern from kate gilbert's site and it's super easy and pretty fast.

now i must get back to writing my statement of purpose for graduate school. i'm feeling a tad purposeless, though, so it's proving rather difficult. sigh.

Big Steps

2005-11-02T15:38:00.000-08:00

Here she is. Super Bon at the finish line!
Pam and Bonnie finished the Marine's Marathon in about 6 and a half hours - walking and running the way. I will let them detail their highlights - but I congratulate both of them for their hard work! Up next: Avon Breast Cancer Walk in San Francisco!

Out on the west coast - somethings are shaping up. Well, actually - a move is. Even though Charis might refuse to hear it, Trevor and I are pondering the move north to Sonoma County. We spend alot of time up in Healdsburg on the weekend and I think the country, redwoods and vineyards are calling our names. So I took a big step last weekend. I MOVED PART OF MY STASH. I realized that if I keep going like I'm going - then I might frighten all of those that love me if we start clearing out our apartment and everyone starts to realize HOW MUCH YARN I ACTUALLY HAVE. Of course I have alot of other random things - shoes, clothes, way too many handbags for one person. But the yarn thing is different. People don't understand how one person COULD HAVE SO MUCH YARN. Especially since I, like many other knitters I know, have carefully crafted different nooks and crannies for my yarn. I can just imagine it now - we are packing up the house and I have to run out for a bit...my roommates start finding yarn and then more yarn and then more yarn. I return to find my entire stash piled neck high in the living room with everyone surrounding it in awe and amazement and complete confusion. Therefore, my stash, just like it's secretive self - will secretly move northward, without anyone knowing...except for those who read this...umm.

And lastly our third BIG STEP of this post is a big shout out for Charis who just now is currently walking out of the doors from spending four hours taking the GRE for applications to Journalism school. She is one BIG step closer and I am sure she did great.
Congrats to everyone for their big steps.

back at it.

2005-10-25T13:12:00.000-07:00

first - my thanks sent out to c-dawg. i have been completely delinquent in my blogging. luckily, right before my hiatus, i convinced her to become completly obsessed with blogging to hold down the fort. but taa.daa. i'm back.

things have been exciting in the wonder girl knits forefront. we have set a date for the first annual wonder girl knits holiday extravaganza - more details to come.
we will gather all of the wonderful knits that we have chugged along on - welcome our friends and fmaily into our homes and sell them at an exorbitant prices! ha, just kidding. but we will have a little holiday gathering in early december with our goods for sale.

on the my own personal knitting front, i have knit my beau a watch cap:
oh blah, the picture won't come up.
it is made of a lovely denim color of 100% wool from Bartlett Yarns. Bartlett Yarns is an incredibly cool mill that spins local wool. From their website:

"In 1821, Ozias Bartlett started his yarn spinning mill on the west bank of Higgins Stream in the village of Harmony, Maine. He took in locally raised wool and returned spun yarn in much the same manner as a village miller taking in grain and returning flour or ground meal. The original Bartlett spinnery probably was first powered by an undershot water wheel that was replaced some time in the 1840’s by a water turbine. "

How cool is that? I love it. BUT I must admit this hat is incredibly thick, incredibly itchy, incredibly big. But my dear beau seems to love it. His afro is so big that it needs something big and warm to cover his ears during the somewhat cold northern californian winters.

In other knitting ventures - I am ALMOST finished with this:

the felted lucy bag

Super Bon is also making it. Did you get to felt it last weekend? Let's see pictures! (This is my meager attempt to get her to start blogging with HER NEW COMPUTER). But I do give her a break because she is running/walking the Marine's Marathon this weekend! With Super Pam! Go wonder girls. Go.

quick update

2005-10-22T13:05:00.000-07:00

quick update (since i know everyone's been on the edge of their seats):

i finished the scarf part of the scarf thingy last night. bam.

i attempted to start the flower and it was driving me insane so i gave it up. in fact, the flower was driving me so insane that it's not clear at this point whether the scarf will ever get its flower.

although i specifically stayed home last night so that i would be well-rested for a full day of grad school productivity, i stayed up until two in the morning finishing the scarf and driving myself crazy with the flower. since my alarm went off at 8a, i am not terribly well-rested.

but i did make it to the library. alllll the way in berkeley. since this post is being posted from said library, i'll leave you to draw your own conclusions about exactly how productive i've been since i got here.

the relativity of productivity

2005-10-21T21:26:00.000-07:00

in some ways, i have had a very productive day. in others, not so much.

it all started this morning at around 8:30am. i lay in bed, still a little sleepy, but knowing that i really should get up and start memorizing vocab or writing a statement of purpose or something productive (in a grad school kind of way). instead, i rolled over, turned on my computer ... and started reading the yarn harlot's archives. hmm, not a good sign.

at 9:00am, my good friend maggie (and co-blogger - mags, get on that) called to see if i wanted to have breakfast. i weighed the options in my head: a) go have a yummy breakfast with mags and catch up or b) start memorizing vocab. which do you think i chose?

after breakfast, maggie decided to come back to my house to do work. on the way home, we stopped at blockbuster. to rent movies for "later."

to be fair to mags, she was actually quite productive. i, however, spent a very very long time staring at a fairly blank computer screen. i was trying to type up a brief summary of why i would be a good journalist for the people writing my recommendations. while i believe in my heart of hearts that i will be an excellent journalist and while i normally am never at lack of things to say, this particular task proved extremely difficult for me. sigh. but i did (after an embarassing number of hours) manage to come up with some bullets - i even had 2-3 complete sentences. whoa. big money.

then i gave up. completely. and picked up the oh-so-cute scarf thingy that i started last night. on that front, i have been extremely productive. i have over two-thirds of it knit! this is an amazing feat of knitting speed and prowess (please note that knitting speed and prowess are both extremely relative). i took a brief break because my hands were starting to cramp but i plan to pick it back up as soon as i'm done with this post. and given that i still have two of those movies (yes, i did rent four and no, "later" was not nearly as late as it should have been) to get through and a whole lotta caffeine in me, i think that maybe, just maybe, i can finish the main scarfy part tonight.

i do feel guilty enough about complete and utter lack of grad school productivity that i'm staying in tonight and getting up early tomorrow morning to go to the uc berkeley library. and let me tell you, those people at the berkeley library, they do not mess around. when you step in those doors, oh you will be productive.

i wouldn't also like to point out the apparent recovery of my emotional stability (i've been going through some turmoil over the past few weeks - boy troubles, roommate troubles, etccetc - nothing really remotely significant at all, but apparently enough to push me over the edge. not sure what it says about me that that's all it takes. sigh.). i have spent the past two evenings all by my lonesome and have not started crying once. this is a big step for c-dawg. go c-dawg.

another day, another project

2005-10-20T21:15:00.000-07:00

i started a new job a few months ago. there are many good things about this new job: good hours; low stress environment; nice people. the best thing, however, is that this new job is located just around the corner from a very very nice yarn shop: atelier.

i have a soft spot in my heart for atelier as it is the place where i bought my very first skein of yarn (if you don't count this horrid acrylic skein that was absolute misery to knit with). and now that i can just pop in at lunch ... oh dear.

i actually have managed to control my yarn-buying impulses. until today. while i should be working on the cabled concoction, that particular wip takes a whole lotta brain power and concentration. and alias was on tonight. and i saw this really cute pattern on knitty.com. soooo, i just dropped by, just to see, you know, if maybe they had some yarn that maybe would work.

needless to say, they did. frog tree alpaca. it is super soft and super pretty and super nice to knit with. aaah.

the actual knitting is going okay. this whole three strands at once business is a little tricky but i'll persevere.

also ... apologies for text only. i forgot to bring my camera home from work. again.

behind on life

2005-10-14T16:38:00.000-07:00

do you ever have times in your life where you just feel like you're moving at a different speed - a much slower, much less functional speed - then everything around you? where by the time you manage to wake up in the morning and get in the shower, your roommate's already out the door, you have four more things on your to do list, you still haven't paid your bills and your room is somehow messier than it was when you went to sleep the night before (or maybe it just seems messier because your light bulb blew out three days before but you haven't managed (due to the slower, less functional speed you're operating at these days) to get to the store to buy a new one so once the sun sets you only experience the messiness of your room through touch)?

welcome to my week. actually, we're on week two of such an existence. so you can imagine how very very far behind i am on life.

the biggest consequence of this, of course, is that i have made woefully little progress on the cabled concoction. actually, woefully little might be a smidge generous. a more accurate statement might be, i have made no progress on the cabled concoction. however, i have learned the cable baby's name: brady. what a great name, yes? and little brady is going to look absolutely smashing in the cabled concoction. i can just feel it.

of course i can also feel time slipping away from me as i move like molasses through the day. hopefully i can get my speed up to marmalade (do you think marmalad is faster than molasses?), make more than no progress on the sweater and get it to brady in time for him to actually wear it before he gets too big.

on that note ... off to knit.

also, i know that my posts have been very text-heavy lately. this is a) because i have made so little progress on any/all of my projects that i have nothing new to show for myself and b) because i have recently been designated the official taker of pictures at work and keep forgetting to bring my camera home with me. i will work on that.

all's well in cable-ville

2005-10-02T22:08:00.000-07:00

needless to say, attempt #3 at the baby sweater didn't go that well. so a couple of hours and many f-bombs later, i was back where i started - with three skeins of yarn and no sweater. but i went to my favorite yarn shop - imagiknit - and poured my troubles out. the very nice woman who was working gave me some advice about purling the other way on my transition stitch from knitting to purling and then knitting through the back the next time around ... anyway, it sounds veryvery confusing but it seems to be working okay. i just made it through (fourth time around) the first round of the cable pattern and it's looking okay. there are still some loose stitches but they are probably not as obvious as i think that they are. and the cables seem to be going okay. at the very least, they sort of look like i would expect cables to look.

so all is well in cable-ville ... although at the rate i'm going, this sweater will be done by the time the baby is 3 years old. sigh.

luckily, i don't have work tomorrow. one of the benefits of working in an academic environment. so even though i should be spending the whole day studying for the gre/writing grad school essays, i will probably spend several/many hours working on this sweater. in my defense, how depressing would it be if i finished the sweater and it was already too small for the baby?

on a final note, maybe i should learn the baby's name. that would help. if i don't learn it soon, he will forever be known to me as "cable baby."

cable me crazy

2005-10-01T15:52:00.000-07:00

i started a new baby sweater. actually, i started a new baby sweater, ripped it out, started again. and now am sitting here trying to convince myself that the second start was good enough all the while knowing that i'm going to rip it out and start again. for the third time.

ARGH.

the sweater is this adorable little cabled concoction (in knitting for baby - great book). admittedly i've never done cables before so that could be the root of all my problems. but whatever i'm doing - even though i personally think what i'm doing is exactly following the directions in the book - is stretching all the stitches around the cables and adding stitches and creating yarnovers and basically making the whole thing look like dog doo.

needless, there will be no pictures of the adorable little cable concoction posted today.

just needed to vent my frustration. now i'm going to go rip it out and start over.

ps - pam, i think this is the sweater you were knitting when you & bonnie came out in may so if you have any pointers send them my way.

yarn in the adirondacks.

2005-09-29T17:53:00.000-07:00

ok. back at it. i have safely traveled from the border of canada and new york - all the way back to san francisco - with all of my new yarn, my new projects, my dirty clothes and a couple of wonderfuly new patterns.
first, i owe everyone a few pics from the trip:

adk01
Here is the Yarn Harlot and Susan and Lisa from Adirondack Yarns, where you will find views like this:

adk02

and this:

adk3

yes. it's true. they have lovely walls and nooks and crannies of yarn and more yarn. and they are very nice. i have never really seen my mom (super bon) grab, touch, and run to buy yarn as quickly as she did here. she got some beautiful fleece artist yarn to knit with. i think her purchases made her go so far as to do this:

mom

that's right...look carefully and you will see THOUSANDS of needles. she is organizing her needles. go super bon.

i have a couple of new projects to speak of - and will post them tomorrow. i am working a day too slow, it seems. go red sox.
ps. thanks to these lovely wonder girls for a lovely weekend:

pambon

harlotting around

2005-09-27T06:41:00.000-07:00

so i see some of us have been a bit absent - so i am going to get back on the blogging horse with some great new pics. i don't have much time - but a quick little preview of who i got to see just last night:

well...it looks like i can't upload my photos right now.
but for a little hint: check out Adirondack Yarns

more to come when i can get my photos up!!!
c-dawg - hope you are feeling better!

insert clever title here

2005-09-12T20:47:00.000-07:00

a few random thoughts before i get into what i want to get into. actually just one thought. not even a thought, just a comment: i have a really hard time titling my posts. i mean, come on! talk about pressure. to somehow come up with a snappy, clever, compelling, witty, interesting summary of your post - all in a handful of words? puh-lease. i think that my hatred of titling is also why i will never successfully on-line date - same concept except in that forum you have to come up with a snappy, clever, compelling, witty, interesting summary of your PERSONALITY (you also need a number of really cute pictures, yet another strike against on-line dating in my book. i'll leave it to the women who can both summarize and take good pictures.)

moving on - i would just like to give a shout out to the amazing power of the internet. yes, yes, i know it might be a little cliche BUT it just never fails to amaze. last night, i was out to dinner with an old friend who happened to be passing through san francisco. we were reminiscing about life back in the day, as you tend to do with old friends, and we started talking about this kid we had swum with back when we were 12. neither of us had talked to him since we were, oh, 12 which is quite a long time ago these days. so we have a few beers, get back to my place and google him. and lo and beyold, he pops up! well, at least a website with an employee with the same namepops up. so i drop an email, just for kicks, and he emails back and it's the right guy! how insane is that! maybe other people don't find this insane but i haven't talked to this guy in FOURTEEN years and i just type his name into a little box on a screen and there he is? just amazing to me.

now i realize that my thoughts on the incredible connective tissue of the internet may not be all that profound or innovative. but i just think that sometimes it's nice to step back and realize what an amazing time we live in. back when i was 12, i don't think i even knew what the internet was (was there an internet when i was 12?). fourteen years may be a long time in the life of charis but in the grand scheme of things it's a mere blink of the eye. so to come that far in a blink - well, like i said, i just think it's worth a shout out.

and speaking of shout outs (i don't think i've ever used the term "shout out" in my life and i just used it three times in one post), i'd just like to throw one (and does one "throw" "shout outs"?) out to maggie for getting involved in the breast cancer walk. it's so easy to just think about doing something without ever working up to the actual doing of the something - but maggie's taking action and i'm proud of her.

These boots were made for walkin'

2005-09-12T19:10:00.000-07:00

And I guess that's just what I'm gonna have to do. I did it. I agreed to walk 60 miles (I think) next July in support of Breast Cancer Awareness. I guess I signed up for a couple of reasons - I realize that this is an epidemic that needs to be stopped, that every three minutes a woman in the US finds out that she has breast cancer, that we need to find a cure, we need to slow this thing down. But as I headed out on my four mile walk today - I also realize that there are other reasons I signed up as well. I realize that walking is actually alot like knitting. You are on your own out there - contemplating, meditating, pondering, wandering, relaxing. Now I know that knitting cables on size 2 dpns is not exactly relaxing or gives you much time to ponder the larger meaning of life...but I do believe that all of us knit because it makes us slow down, take a breather from this fast paced world and give the time back to ourselves. I think (and maybe I will change my mind after 60 miles in two days) that walking may be able to work the same way. I'll let you know.

I finished my shrug. Will upload a photo tomorrow - because I can't find my camera cord! Ah.

travel to a foreign land

2005-09-11T18:56:00.000-07:00

this is matt:

yesterday matt and i traveled to a foreign land. and we managed to do this without leaving the city boundaries of san francisco. that's right, my friends, we went to the marina.

now i have long been a critic of the marina. but i think that i may have to eat my words (or at least some of them). i will still never venture to the marina after dark but on a saturday afternoon, i don't think there's better entertainment anywhere in the city.

our initial goal was to find a pair of eyeglasses for matt. both matt and i have been on a hunt for frames for awhile now. i spotted the pair of my dreams in a little shop in portland and have been trying to track them down in the city - anne et valentin, very cool. matt was looking a little more generally. the problem with glasses is that you're stuck with whatever you decide for a long, long time. so you need to be really, really sure that the ones you're buying are actually the right ones for you (nevermind the whole expense issue ...).

anyhoo ... matt had found this really cool store called bjorn up on union. so we head up there intending to swoop in and swoop out - previously, my preferred technique when forced to venture into hostile territory. but then something weird happened ... we totally and completely got sucked in. we were just trying to find someplace for lunch. but since we are not familiar with the neighborhood AT ALL, we had to wander around. and in the course of our wanderings, we discovered several things:

1. the marina has a lot of really cute shops with really cute things that are really beyond my budget

2. everyone in the marina wears workout clothes. and not because they're working out. they just wear them around, out to pick up the paper or lunch or a new pair of jeans.

3. however, despite the proliferation of workout gear, we did not spot a single gym.

4. the marina has more eyeglass shops in a several block radius than the rest of the city combined (this is obviously based on anecdotal evidence and may be slightly exaggerated. but that's how it felt.)

5. the marina, however, does not seem to have a single yarn store.
matt and i got so sucked in to foreign culture that we both purchased very cool pairs of workout pants. we plan to visit again next weekend but this time we'll look like natives.

ps btw - did everyone notice that i managed to insert not one, but two links?!?!

ch ch ch changes

2005-09-11T18:16:00.000-07:00

So more changes to the blog....I think the black is the best way to go. I kept changing the background color and realized that in different lights it became hard to read. So am thinking we will keep it here for a while and see how it goes.

As for my weekend - which is quickly coming to an end, I am pleased to announced that I think I was single handedly the ONLY person knitting at the Toyota Challenge Mt. Dew Action Tour in San Jose yesterday. My childhoof friend, Matt, got us tickets and for the first time I got to see Motorcross, BMX biking and Skateboarders...I didn't recognize that many names...but was pretty amazed at what these guys could do. And yes, I got in a few rows on my Shrug - which I think I will finish tonight!

East coasters - hello...are you there...come in.
Charis and I decided we want more pics of Super Henry and knitted goods!

a post a day ...

2005-09-09T22:34:00.000-07:00

so i think the real source of my picture-posting confusion is that i am totally and completely unfamiliar with my new computer. i just joined the ranks of the mac-users and am finding that all of the little shortcuts and tricks i spent the past 8 years learning on my pc no longer work AT ALL. little did i know that the keyboard shortcut for "cut text" is not ctrl-x but that weird little apple key-x. it all makes sense now.

i've also been getting frustrated with my inability to use bold and italics when posting. apparently that little problem was all due to the browser that i was using. but i've downloaded firefox and i think i'm good to go on that front as well. phew. i know you were all concerned.

mags - good job on the new look! i really like it. i don't think i minded the old colors as much as you but i do like how the pics look now.

next up on the blogging learning curve: how to insert a link. i might be the world's slowest learning-to-blog person ever. sigh.

new blog face?

2005-09-09T14:47:00.000-07:00

how do we like this? i REALLY hated the green of the last one.
and i think this one actually shows photos better.
i don't know...what do you think? i think i can spice it up a little too...with some knitty knitty pics.

success!

2005-09-08T22:27:00.000-07:00

yay! after much helpful instruction, i managed to move the pics from yesterday's post to the right positions (of course, now the post itself doesn't make any sense but a girl can't fix everything at once ... especially not at 10:30 at night when she's sulking in her room after a fight with her roomie).

mags - glad you're back posting, i've been missing you.

Productivity and Generosity

2005-09-08T20:10:00.000-07:00

Yes! I have been bathing in mineral springs, looking at redwoods, working and working some more. And not too much knitting.
First of all - Charis. YES! You posted pics! Nice work. SO - you will realize that no matter when you want to post a picture and you are in the "Edit HTML" field while posting, the html code of the pic will go directly to the top of your post. Which means that you have to cut and paste it within your post. Really quite easy - if you have gotten this far, you are sure to get it soon.
Second. The baby sweater is so cute. So squishy, so pink, so little, so cute.
And the sock. Well, your sock is much better off than my sock. My sock is hiding away for fear of my manic fingers confusing the tiny needles and knitting where purls should be and purling where knitting should be. Soon enough, he will gain up his courage and arise from the bottom of the bag to make a brave reappearance. I just know it. For now, he hides away.
And lastly, on productivity - well done. If I confessed the state of my room, my kitchen, my living room and my office right now...people might be scared. I thought that before I left for vacation, I left it clean....not so much.

But I guess with the state of our world and nation right now, perhaps dirty rooms aren't such a big deal. I am continually amazed that despite the lack of attention and action that our government continues to display- people around the nation are coming together and helping eachother.
A couple of links to check out some knitters who are knitting for Katrina victims:
Big Pink Cookie
I'm knitting as fast as I can
Give a Little

And for any Bay Area or West Coast readers, I am pleased to announce that our wonderful city of San Francisco just put up this site for emergency plans in case of a natural disaster.
Check out: 72 hours
It's important to have a plan...

I don't have any new pics today...but will get my pics from vacation up soon. I am sorry to say that I actually missed blogging Trevor's first crochet venture. YES, I brought my boyfriend to Imagiknits...where he BOUGHT yarn and stayed up for the next two nights til 3am to FINISH his crochet. He made a bag. I am proud...pics to come.

procastination

2005-09-07T19:34:00.000-07:00

i'm awarding myself with some well-deserved procastination time because i have been VERY productive over the past week or so (it should be noted that productivity is a relative concept). among the productive things i have done: dropped off my dry cleaning; picked up my dry cleaning; went to the grocery store twice AND cooked a meal from the food i bought; went to the bank; renewed my car registration; and, last but certainly not least, installed wireless dsl in my house!!! that last one is pretty huge.

some will perhaps note that i did not manage to clean my room. that's on next week's task list.

but back to the wireless dsl ... this means, my friends, that i am blogging from the comfort of my own home for the very first time. what this also means is that i no longer have an excuse about my inability to upload pictures to the blog. so here goes ...

this first pic is not of a very recent project, but it was my first completed (weeelll, almost completed - i still need to sew the buttons on) sweater so i'm really quite proud of it. admittedly, it was a baby sweater so a smidge easier than a big person sweater but still ...

well shoot ... the picture is there but in the wrong place. humph. okay, let's try this again with a picture of the ever-present sock. this has been coming along slowly but surely. i took it up to seattle with me over labor day weekend and managed to squeeze in a few rows on the plane to and fro. yes, yes, i probably should have been able to squeeze in more than a few rows but i got caught up in the latest issue of us weekly. and then i fell asleep. at this rate the sock will be done in 2010. and then i'll have to start on the second sock. sigh. but anyhoo, enough typing ... i present, THE SOCK:

oh bugger. that didn't work at all. now both pictures are at the top of the post, in the wrong order and not even lined up correctly. argh. a technophobe i am not, that's for damn sure.

well anyway, i'm sure you are all able to figure out which picture is the sock and which picture is the baby sweater. so when you get to the appropriate point in your reading, you should just scroll back up quickly to re-view the picture. not ideal but maybe i can do better next time.

okay, i'm off to do some studying for the gre. or maybe just to curl up on the couch with the latest issue of the new yorker.

mags - where have you been all my life? too busy camping and working?

p.s. for mags

2005-08-27T10:34:00.000-07:00

mags, i don't think you're a slow knitter! also, i really like the second shrug ... is that knit in a rib? i can't tell from the pic.

time management for dummmies

2005-08-27T10:19:00.000-07:00

so the big theory when i quit my super-intense, soul-consuming corporate job to take a part-time, way-chill gig in a little private high school was that i would have oodles and oodles of time to tackle all the things in my life that had been put on hold due to the presence of the aforementioned soul-consuming corporate job.

hmm. that was the theory anyway. the reality is that after week two of new job (which is definitely part-time and definitely way-chill), i'm still behind on my laundry, still haven't dropped off my dry cleaning, still haven't cleaned my room, still haven't gotten in shape AND still haven't finished the freaking blanket. i did make some small progress on the sock. a minute amount of progress that is only discernable if you've been closely examining the sock for signs of progress every 3 minutes or so.

i actually think my time management skills have gotten worse due to this new part-time work situation. it's almost like i have too much time on my hands (not that i'm complaining). so my goal for the upcoming work week (because heaven forbid i actually start being productive right away) is to do at least TWO productive things each day.

now some might think i am setting myself an impossible goal (or some might think that i am quite possibly the laziest person on the face of the planet). but i want to set an attainable standard for myself. then after a few weeks of two productive things each day i might feel inspired to bump it up to THREE. heavens above.

some examples of productive things:

1. finish the third skein and start on the fourth skein (blanket progress)
2. drop off my dry cleaning
3. pick up my dry cleaning
4. laundry
5. reorganize yarn stash
6. knit another inch on the sock
7, 8 & 9. clean my room (due to the time required to complete this task, i am allotting myself three productivity credits)

any other suggestions?

ps.

2005-08-25T14:02:00.000-07:00

check out this wonderful site.
she uses digital video to create little short videos on knitting techniques...
from cables to fair isle to more.

Knitting Help

my two shrugs

2005-08-25T13:10:00.000-07:00

so i realize that sometimes i am an incredibly slow knitter. maybe it is when i am trying to knit cables while reading subtitles of an italian romance film. or maybe i am a...lazy knitter? who knows. but this is my first venture into merino (well any type of lacy yarn) to make a shawl...here it is:

it. is. taking. me. forever.
maybe not as long as charis' blanket. maybe i need to really concentrate on this one. hmmmm. i will keep chugging along though.

OR. maybe i just got distracted when i found this wonderful hand dyed skein in a fun shop in menlo park, ca called The Knitter's Studio. What nice ladies there and they have some really nice yarn....

and what should i make? how about a shrug? or two? that's right, i bought two skeins of two different greens...which i THOUGHT would look nice next to eachother in ONE shrug (but found quite differently once i slowly backed away from the store (think 'dragged by trevor'). So what option do i have but to make TWO shrugs. I found a fun pattern that was knit up in the store that I am trying to recreate - I will pass it on when I find out if I can actually make something wearable.

In other good news - we are taking some time off from work and I am going to spend some wonderful time relaxing, camping, hiking, knitting and reading. Not that I need much downtime from this, my new view from work window (compare this with the concrete jungle of downtown). Bless those wonderful redwoods, they really do bring us peace.

fully addicted

2005-08-15T09:29:00.000-07:00

so i went up to sea ranch for the weekend fully intending to finish the blanket. and while i did make some progress (3 skeins down, 5 to go), i also started ANOTHER project - that would be in addition to the blanket and the baby bootie that i had with me, and the two hats sitting at home. i recently bought a little book of sock patterns and just had to go with it. so i found the only yarn shop in the sea ranch area, bought some sock yarn and some really really little needles and got to knitting. it's actually coming along quite well - the pattern is knit flat for the most part with only the toe knit in the round so i haven't been swearing nearly as much as i would be if i had to knit the whole thing on double-pointed needles.

it's cold and raining AND it's my last day of official unemployment so i think i might just curl up on the couch with the sock and knit the day away.

creating an addict.

2005-08-11T12:18:00.000-07:00

i knew that once charis quit her job that a few things might happen:
1. she would complusively start knitting baby goods. even though we don't really know too many babies.
2. she would compulsively blog all of her new knitting projects.
3. she will start counting knitting and crafts as a "part-time" job.
go c-dawg-knit. go.

i however am swamped in work to my ears. am behind in editing my film. am surrounded in green variegated kid merino. and am planning to hit up the San Francisco Craft Show . pics to come...

compulsive posting

2005-08-11T11:54:00.000-07:00

now that i know how to post i might not be able to stop.

so i just packed for the weekend trip with my fam. i have two bags: one for my clothes and one for all the yarn i'm bringing with me. is that a problem? i just really really want to finish the blanket so feel compelled to bring ALL the remaining yarn with me in case i get on a roll. i'm also bringing the just-started baby bootie. and all my needles in case i find a yarn shop. and two pattern books.

i'm going to take pictures of the projects now and figure out how to post them. i can do it!

yay!

2005-08-10T19:04:00.000-07:00

yes!! i did it!! after several failed attempts, i managed to successfully join the blog. go c-dawg.

no new knitting news to report, except that the blanket is taking me FOREVER. but i'm going up north w/ my parents for the weekend so am hoping to get in some good solid knitting time.

maybe by the time the blanket is done, i'll be proficient enough at this whole blogging thing to actually post a picture.

take me out to the ballgame.

2005-08-05T11:06:00.000-07:00

so many of you have heard about Seattle's Stitch and Pitch. What a great idea...finally making the boredom of a baseball game productive. With Baby Alpaca.

I have another sock in the works...

you might not be able to tell from the picture. but this sock is HUGE. i mean, gigantic. i am hoping that some man i know will be able to scrunch it into a mean pair of hiking boots, but i don't know. this thing just keeps growing. so i keep starting all these socks, but the real question is: how do you make a heel? with this pattern - the heel is knitted out after you finish the sock. but i am looking for a pattern that knits the heel as you go...any suggestions out there?

also - you might have noticed that i am fooling around with the colors of our blog. i just couldn't take the "mean green" anymore. but since i haven't really worked with html since freshman year in college - it's all a bit fuzzy. it will come back me, but for now...we have this nice blue hue.

my day with a harlot

2005-08-04T10:53:00.000-07:00

after spending a whole day with the yarn harlot, i realized how lucky i was to get to meet some great women, see some great yarn shops, and of course, touch ALOT of great yarn. and of course, bloggers blogging bloggers...

i finally got to meet Rachel , another object of my blogging desires. and of course was driven around by the slickest of them all - candi jensen.

we almost had the harlot crocheting by the end of the day, i swear. of course, it was so much fun and i laughed and laughed and laughed. i thank stephanie for teaching me how to cable, giving some good sock advice (yes, i am trying my first pair - haven't hit the heel yet, ugh), and showing me that women can continue to prosper with creativity, energy, knitting needles and a great sense of humor. i thank candi for showing me all the wonderful possibilities of crochet, how great a color brown really is, and teaching me that no matter what comes you way in life - you can overcome anything and find happiness.
my first sock...such little needles...

we had a great time - and the bay area's knitters all came together at STASH - a wonderful shop in berkeley full of really great gals. i will be sure to go back and am thinking about hitting up the wednesday night knit-a-long. here are a few pics of the scene.

and of course, spending that much time around yarn, i couldn't resist when i saw some of this lovely kid merino...i am thinking big scarf/shawl with it. will let you know...

all in all a great day. i finally got on the train and started knitting with my new sock yarn...and missed my stop. and kept knitting. and then missed the next stop. ah well, the sock looks good. thanks for the fun day ladies!

phew. i'm back.

2005-07-26T13:21:00.000-07:00

so i guess i have been sidetracked and haven't hit up wonder girl knits in a while. i have since learned many new things and have had some new ideas and am excited to share some new photos and welcome some new members!
First, SUPER MEMA. Mema is my grandmother, the original super woman of crafts who loves to make fun furry scarves like this:
(thanks to erin for modeling)

recently sent me out some crafty foot gear like these cool foot anklets:

and these wonderful furry fliflops - FURFLOPS - go super mema. i love them.

on my last post i had begun venturing into the dyeing yarn sector.
after repeatedly trying to dye cotton yarn from a sweater i had ripped up - i realized that maybe i should stick with dyeing some wool instead. so i returned to my trusty local thrift store and found this lovely men's sweater that no one wanted...rip rip rip.

to get lots of spaghetti yarn like this:

i brought out the koolaid packets, brought out the white vinegar, the lanolin wool wash and went to town.

the final bunches, some colors are real bright - but the grey heathery wool from the sweater yarn turned the koolaid colors into some deep rich tones that i am really excited about (those are the loose hanks in the back of the pic).

so what's left? why not spinnning. my new wooden drop spindle has been sitting around, lonely for the past couple of months. i decided to return to some roving that i had found at a farmer's market in santa rosa and spun my first skein...

you'll notice it is kinda loose, oh well. i think i am doing better on my second try...

so i haven't been blogging too much but am keeping up with the projects...
anyone else - i know you are out there...super bonnie and her baby sweaters, charis and her mittens....i just know it.

Living in Confusion.

2005-07-01T14:50:00.000-07:00

Annie - what kind words. Well, we can't wait to have you and maybe even THE wonder baby come the the second annual World Knits Summit.
So while wondergirlart lives in awe this week - I continue to live in occasional moments of confusion. First I return to my stewing pots of dyed yarn and hang them out to try only to find...

My colors don't hold. Maybe i am missing something. But wait! The yarn that was dyed with wine is steadfast. wine holds, kooaid doesn't.
Hmmm...
I consult the trusty god-sent 30 year old Foxfire series and realize my missing ingredient...VINEGAR. Of course, old wine is essentially vinegar, which explains the nice light purple color that holds. OK - let's start again. This time I added some vinegar to my colors and put them back out to stew. We will continue to wait...(yes, I do think that patience is my strongest virtue).

Now for the second point of confusion this week...felting a square. As a big thank you to our dear friend Wonder Candi and her husband Wonder Tom for hosting part of the first annual summit, I decided to explore crocheted felting...potholders. Easy enough, crochet a big square and felt. After one session in the wash...my square was not exactly staying square. It was morphing into a rectangle.

Hmmm...
With lack of time...I am currently working on stretching out the felted rectangle into a square, letting it dry in preparation for it's second wash.
And so we wait (I told you about that patience)

And the third point of confusion....on a business trip to Los Angeles this week, I found myself ducking the camera shots, avoiding the come hither looks of a creepy Jimi Hendrix impersonator, and attempting not to run into anyone while becoming mesmerized by the Hollywood squares. And I look up and what do I find??? The biggest ball of yarn in the world, right here on Hollywood Boulevard?

No, silly MC. The Knitting Factory isn't the house of all your crafting dreams, it doesn't have the largest skein of Merino in the world, and they don't have a pack of wild alapcas that grow a special fur blend of silk, alpaca and merino on each animal. No, the Knitting Factory is a supposed famous music venue that oblivious me just didn't know about.
Hmm...cool name though.

Lastly, without confusion I present to you my first finished baby product...a cotton baby blanket to welcome Wonder Baby Ava into our world.

Let the weekend of our independence end this week of confusion.

Living in Awe

2005-06-29T22:51:00.000-07:00

What a week it has been! We had a wonderful trip to Williamstown. Henry especially took to "Country Club Art" as Judge dubbed it. He jumped right into the pool and immediately took to Taconic - AND - in true Henry fashion - made a deep and lasting connection with everyone he met! Henry's Joy for life is awe inspiring.

It was great to reconnect with Bonnie and Pam while the boys were off playing golf. We walked - I was a wimp and only managed 5 1/2 miles, but Pam and Bonnie were hardcore and made 11 miles - and that was just the start of the day. Later we played in the pool and they prepared a gorgeous dinner that was wheeled down pool-side in the garden-way cart (I was no help, I lounged by the pool and even had Andrew put Henry to bed while I just lazed about). Later we were regaled with the hilarious comedy of errors that was the journey to the first World Knit Summit in San Francisco. I saw pictures and was jealous and vow to make it to the next summit - even if I have to ride on a plane with a freaked-out first time passenger, the baby from hell (fyi - not Henry who is a champ at travel, I'll have you know) and make an unplanned stop due to a medical emergency - only to have my luggage lost at the other end. I continue to live in awe of the boundless energy that both Bonnie and Pam have.

As usual there continue to be too few hours in the day. Although I think of blogging daily, I rarely have the opportunity. While in Williamstown, Bonnie mentioned the latest post by MC Crochet. I could scarcely imagine how beautiful and creative it truly is. Maggie has embraced the true spirit of crafting: collecting existing materials, altering them with what ever is at hand, and creating something new and beautiful. All the while, finding time to photo, and blog about it. AND - expanding the blog to include links, AND figuring out how to embed photos within a post - how do you do that anyway - I can only get them to appear as separate posts? So, do we have an answer to my original etiquette question about linking? I told Bonnie that I want to grow up to be Maggie Clark - those words are more true today than ever. Today, I live in awe of MC Crochet.

diy dye

2005-06-20T13:04:00.000-07:00

spaghetti ala gross? noodles a-no-no?

The reviews are in:
"Why are you cooking spaghetti in urine?"
"That looks like something I saw in the markets of Ho Chi Minh city"
Well, no, it's not what it looks like - it is the yarn that I had unravelled (see below).
To start off, I wrapped the wonder white skeins of cotton around my empty paper towel holder, for lack of a correct knitty noddy.

make-shift kitchen knitty noddy

Once wrapped into a hank (correct term?)- I dipped it into the warm water and dropped my ingredients in. I decided to go for the basics:
1. a 2003 bottle of merlot (i will leave the vineyard out of this, because i didn't really like the wine, hence it being used as a dye instead of getting drank).
2.purple surf koolaid.
3.green food coloring.
4.yellow and red food coloring.
5.tumeric.

currently they are all stewing out in the sun - we'll see what we find next week...

You spin me right round baby, right round.

2005-05-31T15:15:00.001-07:00

So, over the nice long weekend, I unravelled a sweater.
An off-white cotton/acrylic blend, GAP roll-neck small, bought on Friday at my local thrift store for 5$.
So...when I began the unravelling, I was a bit miffed. I was cutting and cutting and cutting little tiny threads on the seams from the BOTTOM of the sweater...to little avail. After an hour, I had unravelled about an inch of yarn. This was not really worth it.
THEN ... i decided to charge from the TOP of the sweater. After snipping a few threads, i pulled and whhishhhh...the entire seam came out in one pull! THEN i began to pull from the neck and oooh how fast it went. A very large skein of white beautiful cotton yarn within minutes.
All in all (with my mistakes included) I think it took me about 2 and a half hours to unravel. Was it worth it? I have yet to decide (i will when i begin the knitting) but I do know that I actually learned alot about stitches - how they are connected and unconnected. I think that any beginner knitter should unravel a sweater - I think it helps in the freak-out factor when you drop a stitch, gives you a much better understanding of knits and purls and also how a sweater might get sewn together.
all in all...good stuff.

2005-05-31T15:15:00.000-07:00

The unravelling has yet to begin.

2005-05-31T15:13:00.001-07:00

Taaa-daaa. four big skeins.

2005-05-31T15:13:00.000-07:00

Wonder Skeins

2005-05-24T10:37:00.000-07:00

my second sweater ever...it is going pretty fast, except now i have hit the wall of double pointed needles land for the sleeves. ugh.

2005-05-24T10:35:00.000-07:00

Beads, Beads, Beads

2005-05-24T10:34:00.000-07:00

Wonder girls checking out beads

My first blog..and loving it!

2005-05-22T15:02:00.000-07:00

Well hello all you wonder women! This is my first attempt at a blog-so far I think it is working-not ready to attempt the photos yet! As for my wonder knitting-I just finished a great poncho made out of chunky alpaca-I'm donating it to a Nursing Mother's group that is trying to raise money for a lactation consultant. Started a funky scarf yesterday with yarn purchased in San Fran-loving the texture-my plan is to make the fringe out of silk ribbon with wooden beads attached. This morning over coffee I started another pair of men's socks on those short needles-very comforting to knit with-they don't poke you. Wondergirl Art-thanks for the info about the Debbie Bliss book-I just ordered it from Amazon-now I have three knitting books scheduled to arrive here in the next week!!!! I'll keep in touch .

Up and running!

2005-05-18T16:43:00.000-07:00

Yes! Hooray for wonder girl art and henry for making their first appearance and blog.
As to etiquette on blogs - I am just not sure. Perhaps we can make a list of wonderful links that we like for others to connect to.

I did get to see pics of Henry and the sheep. I miss Henry and I only met him once.
This weekend we had our first annual WORLD KNITS SUMMIT. It was a crazed weekend of senegalese food, yarn shops, vintage stores, thrift shops, yarn stores, mediterranean food, yarn stores, wine and many many hours of knitting on Candi's porch watching the hills of Sonoma while knitting AND crocheting our little hearts away. Hopefully we will get some pictures up - once we get Pam and Bonnie up and blogging.

We came up with SO many fun ideas and I look forward to where our little world of knitting will take us - nationwide chapters of world knitters?? non-profit leagues of women teaching eachother to knit?? sending equipment and materials to women in need to design, make and sell their own crafts to help sustain their family and community?? There are many directions and I think if we keep moving forward - we can create change.

Ok, so I'm not sure how this works but . . .

2005-05-13T23:12:00.000-07:00

I saw the first post, and responded with a short comment, I think it worked, at least I can read my comment when I log on - don't know if anyone else can.

My biggest news is that I just finished my first felted project!!!! I couldn't be more excited. I made the most adorable (if I do say so myself) felted slippers for Henry. He will love them, if I ever relent and let him put them on. I am also pleased with myself because I think I gauged the size just about right. They are still a little big, but as they can't be worn in the summer, I think they will fit perfectly next fall.

During the felting process I was very nervous because one slipper was felting to a smaller size than the other. But in a last ditch effort, I felted the bigger slipper one more time, and voila, a matching pair. Pleased. As. Punch.

Needless to say my coworkers were sufficiently impressed and amazed as I was regaled with a lot of "you made that? it doesn't even look like it was knit!" I have no shame; I basked in the glory of the compliments showered upon my knitting project.

People are inspired, borrowing patterns from me left and right. The bug is catching, soon our quest to take over the world will be realized U-Haaaahaaahaaahaaaa!

So, I'm suffering from withdrawal. After a flurry of projects, (a hat for Lucy, a blanket for baby Reese, a blanket for Annabelle, a sweater and slippers for Henry, a sleeveless turtleneck for myself - not quite finished) I don't know what to do next.

Pam and I went to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival last weekend: - this is Henry wanting to grab that lamb's ear and chew on it. And for a most glorious Mother's Day gift, Pam bought me the most gorgeous yarn from the Brooks Farm tent. It is burning a hole in the basket I keep my yarn in, just dying for me to make something with it. But I'm torn, it is so lovely, I need to find the perfect pattern for it. I'm thinking socks with one of the skeins, but I need to go out and get sock needles, preferably the ones that the Harlot raves about.

Until then, I will buckle down and read the Harlot's newest book "At Knit's End: Meditations for Women Who Knit Too Much", (which I failed to have signed when I had the chance, I'm an idiot and forgot it at home, when practically the whole point was to bring it to Sheep and Wool to get it signed (ok, not the whole point)) surely it will inspire me.

On another note, I'm new to this blog thing. What is the etiquette here? Like when I mention the Harlot, should I create a link to her blog? Should I ask permission before doing so? It would seem appropriate to seek permission, but I don't know, don't you want as many hits as you can get? Thoughts?

Finally, I tried to blog a photo - did it work?